


Death Finds a Way

by ElanGrey



Category: My Brother My Brother and Me (Podcast), The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Afterlife, All dogs go to heaven!, Alternate Origin Story, Astral Plane, Buttercup McElroy, Friendship, Gen, In-Universe RPF, Is this allowed, Knitting, M/M, Metaphors, Origin Story, Other, Prophecy, RPF, Shrimp heaven now, What is fiction anyway, bffls, fantasy fashion, is this real life, postmodern
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-16
Updated: 2019-02-28
Packaged: 2019-03-19 06:05:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 55,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13698381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElanGrey/pseuds/ElanGrey
Summary: An origin story for the postmodren era: how can one person come to terms with death itself?  Divisions between life, death, and fiction blur as Travis McElroy wakes up in the astral plane with no knowledge of how he got there-- or why.





	1. Chapter One

It began with light.

 

Colorless light that blazed all around him without a clear source, light so intense it seemed to almost sing in its ferocity. He came to suddenly but his eyes took their time to open, shy of the brightness, as his other senses returned one by one. Then came the realization he was not alone.

 

_ Buttercup _ , he thought, reaching for her familiar soft warmth. She had been curled up beside him-- he was laying down, but he couldn’t tell where, and his vision was compromised by the light-- but as he reached for her, she stood, and he heard her shake herself out as if she had been swimming. The familiar jingle of her tags was absent, though.  _ What--? _

 

His thoughts felt like they were arriving out of order. Why didn’t Buttercup have her collar on, and how did they get here? Where even  _ were _ they? The damnable light wouldn’t relent and he couldn’t get his bearings. He reached for his glasses, only to realize they weren’t there. Nothing was. He realized with a start that wherever he was lying, wherever he was with his dog, with frankly no ideas as to what had preceded his arrival... he was lying there naked and vulnerable.

 

From behind him, a low and accented voice intoned, “Travis Patrick McElroy.”

 

Oh,  _ shit!  _ Had he fallen asleep? Where was he supposed to be right now-- a show? Waking up from a nap sometimes left him feeling disoriented but it usually passed in a moment or two, never this bad. He turned, blindly, toward the voice, and asked, stupidly, “Am I late?”

 

There was a pause, and what might have been the shuffling of pages. If only he could  _ see _ … but then, as he found the outline of the dark figure that he assumed had spoken, it cleared its throat and said, again, more softly, “Travis Patrick McElroy, born November eighth nineteen eighty-three.” As if modulating to his tone, the light around them seemed to shift and settle, finally dimming enough for Travis to make out his surroundings.

 

He was on some kind of fine sand, the sound of waves lapping distantly beyond. With his limited, glasses-less vision, he could see now that the figure was tall and dressed in flowing cloth that moved continuously in an unfelt breeze. Their face was shadowed but he could see a glint of something ghastly pale beneath the hood. Travis moved to stand and the figure held out a hand to restrain him. Buttercup shifted nervously beside him at the movement.

 

“Travis,” the figure said, an ice-cold hand settling on his shoulder as the figure knelt in front of him. “You’re early, as a matter of fact. Although--” and here he paused, somewhat awkwardly. “I guess it wouldn’t be entirely inaccurate to say that you are late.” The cold hand on his shoulder gave a friendly squeeze and, even with his shitty vision, Travis could now see the pale shape beneath their hood coalescing into a grinning skull. He rubbed his eyes, disbelieving, but as soon as he looked again the unmistakable death’s head had been replaced by a human face with dark, kind eyes.

 

“I’m sorry, did I… miss something?” Travis asked. He wasn’t sure if he should be terrified or annoyed. He wouldn’t have put it past Griffin or Justin to pull some kind of stupid stunt to freak him out, but they didn’t usually come out of the blue like this. He tried to think again on how he got there and felt a searing pain in his head. “Or, am I, I don’t know! Dreaming?” he tried again. The figure chuckled.

 

“Damn it!” Travis groaned, rubbing his eyes again. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be rude, but I can’t see a  _ goddamn _ thing, and I don’t know how I got here, and--”

 

“Oh,” the figure said, and moved one chilly finger to the center of Travis’ forehead. Immediately his vision cleared and his eyes adjusted as easily as if he had just pushed on his glasses. “There,” the figure said. “Better?”

 

Travis could see now that he was standing on a small island surrounded by a brightly-colored swirling sea. The figure in front of him was done up in some kind of fantasy costume, flowing robe and cloak all in shades of shadowy grey and midnight blue with a sharp black suit underneath. His face was remarkably handsome, and he held an enormous volume in broad hands tattooed black with raven’s wings.

 

“O… kay,” Travis said. “So this is weird. Um, thank you? For fixing my… eyes? But I still don’t know where I am. Or-- or who you are, for that matter.”

 

“Forgive me, my friend,” the figure said. “My name is Kravitz. I’m here to help.”

 

“Help with what?” he asked. He was trying hard not to feel too grumpy about the whole damn confusing thing when he-- wait.  _ Wait. _

 

“Kravitz?” he asked the figure. “Like, you’re the-- wait! I know this. You’re the… thrall? I think? For the Raven Queen? Is that right?”

 

Kravitz looked taken aback, but he nodded. “I-- yes, that’s right enough. How did you…?”

 

“Cool,” Travis said, brushing off Kravitz’s hand and scrambling to his feet. “Okay, cool cool cool. Um, so, what is it you need? An… autograph?”  _ A pint of my blood,  _ he wanted to ask, but he’d had bad luck in the past with fans being too literal with his suggestions. And this guy was apparently very literal. Travis stepped back another few feet, Buttercup at his heels.

 

Kravitz, meanwhile, was looking puzzled.

 

“Okay, so, I feel like I should just say, this is a-- I mean,  _ you know _ , right, that the whole thing was a, a fictional world that my family and I made? Like, just checking, because it kind of seems like you have taken it a little far, and also, you’ve taken… well, you’ve taken my clothes, and there’s a whole other conversation we should probably be having around that, but let’s just establish the basics here first.”

 

“Fictional?” Kravitz asked, cutting him off. “I am not fictional. You do not appear to be so.”

 

“Yeah, okay,” Travis said, “but like you  _ do know  _ that you-- the idea of you, of Kravitz-- you were invented by my little brother Griffin. You know that, right?”

 

“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Kravitz said, “but I admit you’ve caught me a little off my game. Usually by now I’ve introduced myself a bit more, and tried to, I don’t know, ease into things--” Travis took a step backward, hands reflexively covering himself. Kravitz rolled his eyes impatiently. “Not like that. But, I mean, here we are, and apparently you know who I am, so let me just say… Travis Patrick McElroy, you are dead. You have died. I am very sorry for your loss but I am here to usher you into the beyond, to bring your soul to rest where it belongs.”

 

\--

 

Travis was sitting on the ground again, though he had no memory of falling. 

 

Kravitz’ words tolled like a bell in his mind, ringing out:  _ you are dead, you have died _ . 

 

Buttercup whined and licked his hand and he lifted it to pet her without thinking-- only to stop halfway there. He turned to Kravitz. “Okay, so you’re telling me I died, and what, my dog did too? What kind of horseshit is that?” Anger blazed through him, sudden and unexpected and not at all unwelcome. “Who the fuck  _ are  _ you? What did you do to me?”

 

Kravitz held up a hand. “Peace, Travis. I didn’t do anything to you. I told you, I’m here to help.” Travis was aware of hot tears leaking down his face, but did not move to stop them. Confusion, anger, grief, and fear roiled in him. Buttercup resumed licking his hand.

 

“You are understandably upset,” Kravitz began. He was visibly uncomfortable. Travis wondered if this kind of emotional reckoning was beyond his usual call of duty, then immediately chastised himself for buying into this guy’s weird cosplay bullshit.

 

“But, Travis, I think there might be something… wrong.” Kravitz’ accent had faded now and it left his voice sounding earnest, even plaintive. “Look, I know you’re confused. Usually folks can’t remember their last few minutes, maybe hours before they actually leave their body, depending on how you go. But I mean...” he hefted his enormous tome with one hand, rifling through its pages with the other. “Usually this bad boy gives me the exact date and time and manner of death. But you’re-- you’re  _ way _ ahead of schedule.” He snapped the book shut. “Don’t get me wrong, I work on commissions and I’m happy to take a little surprise bump in the old moneybags now and again, but this, Travis? This doesn’t feel right.”

 

Kravitz tossed the book aside and, in a fluid motion, turned on his heel and dropped gracefully to sit beside Travis. They sat side by side, staring at the water, Buttercup sniffing Kravitz thoroughly and wagging her tail at the promise of a new friend. Long moments passed before Travis felt he had collected himself enough to talk. He took a deep breath. Then another. Then another.

 

“What the  _ fuck _ ,” he said, exhaling, but it wasn’t a question. Kravitz patted his back awkwardly. He had let his hand settle back to its skeletal form so Buttercup could gnaw on it-- which she had been doing, quite happily-- and the bony, chilly, slightly damp pat that he provided was more disconcerting than comforting. Still, it seemed friendly, and Travis appreciated that.

 

“So, let me just think out loud for a second here,” Travis said. “You say I’m dead. You also say I’m not supposed to be, maybe, probably. Yeah?” Kravitz nodded. “Okay. So I’m dead, and Buttercup is dead too--”

 

Kravitz laughed, an unexpectedly joyful and musical noise. “Buttercup? Is that her name?” Travis turned to him with raised eyebrows. “Sorry, that’s just-- that’s really cute. But.” He cleared his throat. “Continue.” 

 

“So  _ we’re _ both dead and we’re here, and you’re here, and maybe--  _ Jesus-- _ okay, I guess you probably don’t know this, but when I was  _ alive _ , I had this kind of… story, I guess? … that I made with my brothers and our dad, and one character in this story that we made was a grim reaper, named Kravitz, who worked for the Raven Queen and, like, harvested souls? I guess? So you can maybe see how this is all a little fucked up for me right now.”

 

Kravitz looked thoughtful but said nothing. A few feet away, Buttercup was going to town on Kravitz’ now-dismembered skeletal hand, her wagging tail fanning black sand from side to side as she chewed away in a state of bone-induced bliss.

 

“So, I guess, if this is-- if this is going to be a  _ thing _ , I have some questions, a couple of suggestions. First things first… where can I get some goddamn pants around here?”

 

\--

 

“Oh,” Kravitz said, “Sorry.” He swept his cloak off with a gallant flourish and held it out to Travis, one edge of it trailing slightly without the use of his left hand. (“Oh,” Travis said, “sorry,” and he wrested the hand back from Buttercup). He exchanged hand for cloak gratefully, first wrapping himself in the cloth like a blanket, then-- realizing how very extremely  _ exposed _ he still was-- settling on a sort of goth toga look that he hoped would hold up.

 

“Better?” Kravitz asked him again. Travis nodded. He was trying to find it in his heart to be grateful for  _ something _ here, in this weird fucked up dreamscape, and decided he might as well be grateful for Kravitz’s kindness.

 

“I’m grateful for your kindness,” he informed Kravitz, with as little grudge in his voice as he could muster. Kravitz gave a short, curt nod that did nothing to hide his obvious satisfaction at the admission.

 

Travis supposed he could also be grateful for the fact that Kravitz was, actually, very handsome (now that there was skin over his skull, anyway). Looking good was important. He could respect that. He stopped short of sharing this particular gratitude with Kravitz as well.

 

“Well, I should think we have rather a lot to discuss,” Kravitz said, voice slipping back into his original London accent. Travis tried to push away the idea that he was enjoying this. “Or, at least, rather more than I typically am able to discuss with my… clients. Come along.”

 

The three of them turned and set to pacing along the beach toward a large, dark building that Travis hadn’t  noticed before. A light rain began to drift over them, misting the edges of their clothes and leaving bright silvery pearls of moisture in Kravitz’s magnificently long dreadlocks. Buttercup shook herself again and whined pitifully at Travis until he picked her up. The fog and the rain conspired to make the building seem imposing, almost ghastly, in the now rapidly-dimming light.

 

“Oh, shit!” he said, suddenly, and Kravitz stopped abruptly. “Is this the  _ astral plane _ ?”

 

Kravitz just looked at him for a moment.

 

“Yes,” he said.

 

He resumed walking. Travis jogged to catch up with him. “Okay, but, like… wow. You know? It didn’t really sink in before.”

 

“What didn’t?”

 

“How familiar this all is.”

 

\--

 

Kravitz lead them through a massive stone archway, carved into curving feathers which framed an inscription in an unknown language. Halfway down an obsidian road leading to the face of the enormous stone-and-steel building, Kravitz steered them off and toward a softly worn footpath. It stretched a dozen yards or so before it ended at a simple wooden door set into the stone wall, well off to the side of the main entrance.

 

“I think,” Kravitz said as he unlocked the door and held it open for Travis, “we have rather a lot to talk about.”

 

The door opened to an incongruously cheerful room panelled in light wood and crowded with overstuffed furniture. Kravitz flicked a finger at an iron wood stove in the far corner, which immediately was lit from within by a bright, warm blaze. A snap, and a blue enameled teapot appeared on top. “Wait here a moment,” Kravitz said. “And please-- uh, make yourself comfortable.”

 

Travis sunk gratefully onto the couch nearest the fire, this one patterned with faded damask roses. Looking around, he couldn’t help but be surprised by Kravitz’s choice in furnishings. Clumsily crocheted afghans were heaped in multiples over the backs of every chair and sofa, most in subdued tones of yellow and pink. The floors were the same light wood as the walls but were barely visible under what appeared to be hand-braided rugs. On the walls were countless unframed watercolor variations on the same view in different lighting, and Travis could tell by the prismatic waves and sharply contrasted sand that they must have all been painted from the same vantage point-- somewhere, it seemed, that must be very nearby to where he had woken up on the island.

 

Kravitz returned to the main room from down the hall, holding a pile of cloth. “These belonged to a friend of mine. I think they should fit you alright,” he said, and held the bundle out to Travis. Travis shook it out.

 

“Blue jeans?” he asked, disbelieving.

 

Kravitz shrugged. “They looked to be about the right size. Unfortunately I don’t know that anything of mine would fit.” Travis struggled against the urge to compare Kravitz’s body to his own in an up-down appraisal. He didn’t need to; Kravitz was easily half a foot taller than him. More than that, the process of removing his cloak had revealed him to be made mostly of ropy muscle and extremely long and graceful limbs. Travis shifted uncomfortably.

 

“Well, turn your back, at least,” he shot at Kravitz.

 

Kravitz shrugged. “I’ve seen it all already,” he said.

 

“Not helpful,” Travis informed him, and struggled resignedly into the jeans. He was pleasantly surprised to find them worn down to a comfortable softness, and well-fitting. He wished one of his brothers was present to make the obvious Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants joke so he wouldn’t have to do it himself.

 

All at once, he felt the lack of them keenly. It was more than just  _ missing _ his brothers; it was the sudden awareness of an empty space he had never felt before, a distance he had never before thought to even conceive of.

 

Would he see them again?

 

Did they know, yet, that he was gone?

 

And what about Teresa, and Bebe? Was his entire family supposed to get up and keep moving on, keep performing in a play with a principal actor suddenly missing?

 

Not knowing the rules here, not knowing if this really  _ was _ death (or the afterlife or the astral plane or  _ whatever _ it could be-- or was-- or wasn’t), not knowing if he would ever again see the people he loved most, blanketed him in weight sudden and absolute.

 

He was reminded, painfully, of their mother’s death. Not the moment of her passing, or whatever her journey might have looked like on the other side ( _ was it anything like this? _ ) but the terrible morning after when he had woken up and been forced to remember all over again that it wasn’t a dream, she was really gone-- and, worse, the moment that had followed that, and the next, where his living breathing body went on moving without her in the world. 

 

He remembered trying to get out of bed and staring at his feet on the floor, morning sunlight spliced across them, wishing he couldn’t feel its warmth, not even willing to stand, when Justin had knocked on his bedroom door. They were all children again, cast together in this strange sea of missing and grief and the unknown. Justin had leaned in, one arm against the opposite frame of the doorway, unwilling as ever to intrude.

 

“Hey, Scraps,” he’d said, softly, and Travis could hear faint grains of sleep rasping in his voice. They were all raw-throated and red-eyed from crying, they had been for days on end, but hearing Justin’s tired resignation told Travis that Justin had woken up to the same nightmare he had.

 

“I couldn’t--,” he’d started, and dropped his head into his hands. Then Justin was sitting next to him, and Griffin was following close behind, as always, though Travis hadn’t even seen him there in the hallway… and then Justin’s arm was around his shoulder and Griffin had settled onto the floor, leaning against Travis’ legs, in the same way he used to when they all got up too early on Christmas mornings and whispered in one room together until the sun came up and they could wake their parents.

 

No one had to say it. 

 

The  _ gone _ -ness of her hung in the air, floated like dust motes around them. The sunlight stretched and grew, climbing from Travis’ feet to his knees, covering Griffin in a mellow glow. Time passed. Together, they quietly cried. What else could be done, when they were still bound by bodies that had been left behind?

 

What would they do now, his brothers, a hole between them where his living breathing body should be?

 

\--

 

“Travis?” came a voice. He was immediately snapped out of his reverie and he swiped the back of one hand across his face hastily to hide his tears. Kravitz hovered awkwardly a few feet away. “Are you… is everything okay?” he asked carefully.

 

Travis nodded. He felt mixed up and anxious. He wished he could download information on what was happening directly into his brain and skip the part where he had to admit, out loud, that he might be dead. He could hardly bear to form questions, though dozens of them were sprouting up in his mind. He settled for mumbling to Kravitz: “I don’t suppose you do hugs.”

 

And then lanky, warmthless Kravitz was wrapping him in a firm embrace, and it ceased to matter whether he was death incarnate or a sociopath cosplayer or just some unlucky bastard with a job to do.

 

“Sorry about my-- well, about my whole thing. The cold thing,” Kravitz muttered against his hair. “It’s been a long long time since anyone’s asked me for a hug.” With a final squeeze he let Travis go.

 

“Well, you’re a really good hugger,” Travis said, and they both laughed a little shakily. He supposed that was something he could be grateful for, too.


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kravitz is reminded of a friend. Travis relies on his academic background with mixed success. A delivery is attempted. Buttercup throws away her shot at adventure.

Kravitz had settled Travis on the couch with a chipped mug of steaming tea, an afghan draped over his still-shirtless shoulders to replace the rain-soaked cloak. Kravitz himself dragged a chintz armchair to rest on the opposite side of the fire. 

 

“I imagine you have a lot of questions,” he began, “but-- and I apologize in advance for this-- but you look like hell, my man, and I don’t even intend that to be some kind of pithy joke. So maybe it would be easiest for me to talk for awhile about what I know, and we could take it from there?”

 

Travis nodded. He was holding the teacup up to his face, not quite drinking, just inhaling, enjoying the way the steam tickled his mustache. Buttercup wriggled her way into his lap and he could feel some of the stress and shock ebbing away as he stroked her fur.

 

“Alright,” Kravitz said, bracing his elbows on his knees and leaning forward. Firelight danced golden across his sharp, coffee-brown cheekbones and illuminated a thick swath of silver curled among his locs. He templed long fingers together, brows furrowed.

 

“First, it should probably go without saying that I do not typically take in sob stories for tea time. Dead is dead. That’s the deal.

 

“But, something about your entry made me pause. It’s not-- well, this sounds silly, but the entry for your death is not straightforward. It’s more of a… a choose-your-own-adventure, if you will.”

 

Travis looked at him blankly.

 

Kravitz shook his head. “Alright, yes, that’s vague, I should probably take into account that you have no prior experience with the citation style for the Eternal Tome, so let me explain. When a person enters their world, an entry for them appears in my book. It’s like a table of contents for their life, but the only chapter where anything is fleshed out--” he stopped to crack an awkward smile, revealing incongruously pointed incisors and a gold-capped bicuspid. “No pun intended!,” he added jovially.

 

Travis did not laugh, did not blink, but his eyebrows furrowed slightly.

 

Kraviz sighed. “Fleshed out? A pun on-- alright, yes, fine, forget it. Anyway, the only chapter where I get any real detail or information is the last chapter. Inevitably and, I would say,  _ unimaginatively  _ titled ‘Death’. But you have…” He snapped, and the book itself re-appeared in his hands. He flipped it open and traced a long finger down the page. “... You have three chapters, three different deaths, and they’re not even all in the same dimension. I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

 

Travis now raised his eyebrows, consternation forgotten. “Really, you haven’t? I would have thought…”

 

“I’m very good at my job, Travis Patrick McElroy,” Kravitz said in a deadly calm voice, and Travis shivered.

 

“Don’t use my full name,” he said, trying to hide his goosebumps. “It makes me feel like I’m in trouble at Sunday School, or like… I don’t know… like the grim reaper is waking me up on a weird beach to tell me I’m dead.” At this, Kravitz cracked his jagged smile again, and Travis realized now that its awkwardness was probably due to a lack of practice.  _ How often does Death get to grin? _

 

“Fair enough,” he said. “Just, what, then? Travis?”

 

“That works!”

 

“Alright. Travis. To answer your question, no, I have not seen multiple deaths for the same individual before. As a rule, I do not allow them.”

 

“Okay,” Travis said, processing. “So what about…” he gestured at his lap. Kravitz tilted his head, eyebrows raised. “Wait, I mean! Shit.” Travis sighed. “I meant, what about Bluejeans?”

 

“Do you mean-- do you mean to tell me you know Barry?”

 

Travis had to resist the urge to laugh.  _ Of course  _ it wouldn’t just be Kravitz that was real. Barry fucking Bluejeans had to be as well.

 

“Yeah, Barry Bluejeans. I mean, no, I don’t know him, but I… argh.” he clenched a fistful of his hair in frustration. “Do you remember what I said earlier, about how I had a story that I made with my family? And I thought you were a character in that story?”

 

Kravitz gave the tiniest of nods.

 

“Well, okay. So Barry was a character in that story, too. And there were others that I-- hey!” Travis dropped his hands and looked up at Kravitz, excitement coursing through him hot and sudden. “Hey! Yeah, okay! Does this mean-- do you know Magnus? And Merle? And… holy SHIT! And  _ Taako!? _ ”

 

He couldn’t help but shout at the last part, jumping to his feet and displacing Buttercup in the process. Offended, she curled up at Kravitz’s feet and turned accusing eyes to Travis.

 

“Sorry, Butt,” he said to her, then looked back up to Kravitz. “Taako, though! Right? For sure!”

 

Kravitz looked at him blankly.

 

“Dammit,” Travis said, sitting back down. “I guess that doesn’t make sense. Well, at least now you know how I feel.”

 

“Who-- or, what-- is Taako?” Kravitz asked.

 

“Your… ah, goddammit. I don’t want to spoil it for you.” He sighed again. “So anyway. How do you know Barry?”

 

“Barry… Barry Bluejeans first arrived when he was very young. There had been war in his world, and he had been very sick besides. Through some design of fate, the moment of his natural passing from his illness occurred at the precise same moment that a renegade member of the militia firebombed his family’s home, and as such his death entry needed to be submitted to review for clerical purposes.

 

“Per the Raven Queen’s administrative practices, all review entries are subject to a period of public comment and contestation. I had been appointed Barry’s guardian for the duration of that time. He stayed here with me and I-- I grew fond of him. I took it upon myself to argue of favor in his reinstallation in his home world as both possible causes of his death could be deemed circumstantial.” Kravitz let out a long breath, his eyes distant.

 

“Schrodinger’s death,” Travis offered, feeling smug at his own reference.

 

“Uh, sure,” Kravitz responded. “Whoever that is. Anyway, I argued his case effectively enough to win, but it wasn’t until I brought the news back to him that I realized... I was sending him back to a life where he would live as an orphan. His whole family had perished in the bombing, after all. 

 

“He’s a good boy, so he said he was grateful, but I could tell the loss weighed on him more heavily than the success of being-- resurrected, I suppose, in lieu of a better phrase.” Kravitz paused again, longer now, though Travis refrained from interrupting. Finally, he moved his shoulders in what could have been a shrug and what could have been embarrassment.

 

“I decided, against my own better judgment, and flagrantly against all rules of being the arbiter of souls, I decided to…  well, I made excuses to visit Barry and, in turn, have him come back to visit me, so that he was never fully alone. He’s grown now, and his research keeps him quite busy.” A glow of pride was growing in his tone. “He still comes back to visit when he can, though. A very good boy.”

 

Finally he met Travis’ eyes and seemed to remember himself. His expression morphed abruptly from pride to suspicion. In the same low, deadly voice he had used before, Kravitz intoned, “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that this information should never reach the Raven Queen, if you ever happen to meet her. That’s clear, isn’t it?”

 

“Oh yeah,” Travis scrambled to say. “Crystal!”

 

At this, Kravitz cleared his throat and shifted away from Travis, sitting up straight in his chair. Several long seconds passed where he only noises were small crackles and pops coming from the woodstove and the thumping of Buttercup’s contented tail against the furniture. When Kravitz at last spoke again, his showy London accent had returned.

 

“That’s all well in the past, though. And I told you I’d give you what I know about your situation. So!” He straightened his tie. “Here’s what I can say. You came here, to the astral plane, because you are dead. I already filled you in on your entry in the Eternal Tome, so on that front you know essentially as much as I do. It’s interesting that there have been no other arrivals from the Plane of Thought since you came through, but sometimes there’s a lull. Right before a football match ends, you know, or on your holidays.” Kravitz’ face lit up suddenly. “Do you get Candlenights, where you’re from?”

 

“Uh…  _ kinda _ ,” Travis responded. “I think we-- well, I, I think I invented Candlenights, actually.”

 

“Well! Thank you for that, then!” Kravitz said, still beaming. “It’s my favorite. Anyway, where was I?

 

“Oh yes… so, you died on the Plane of Thought, you have three deaths listed in the ET--” 

 

(“Sorry, what?!” Travis asked, busting up. “The ET?” Kravitz responded, adding, “Eternal Tome?”  “Oh, for sure. Sorry. Bad manners on my part. Go on.”) 

 

“--So you have three different deaths listed in at least two planes, as far as I can tell, but I don’t have a bounty for your name, so your coming here to the Eternal Stockade is something of a fluke as well.”

 

“I’m really liking all these names that lead with ‘Eternal,’” Travis cut in. “Great branding.”

 

Kravitz ignored him. “This is all to say: it seems to me like you’ve got some unfinished business, my man. Why you are haunting the Astral Plane-- and not, I don’t know, your childhood home-- is beyond me. But truth finds a way.”

 

“Like life,” Travis appended.

 

Kravitz studied him through narrow eyes. “You really like those one-liners, don’t you,” he said. Travis shrugged. “I add what I can! I’m not as funny as my brothers. You would like them.”

 

He thought a moment, he added, “Although I hope it’s a very long time before you meet them. Or my dad, or…” He found that his throat tightened uncomfortably when he tried to say Teresa’s name. He coughed and went on, attempting levity,  “Well, any of our family, really. And, like, that actress who played Topanga, or...”

 

“You’ve gotten off-track,” Kravitz interrupted. 

 

“True,” Travis agreed. “But hey, I just realized something! Shouldn’t my mom be around here somewhere?” Travis was pleased to notice that the thought of seeing her elicited only a warm glow of anticipation, and not the dropping stone of sorrow that her memory usually triggered in the pit of his stomach.

 

“I… I am sure she is, Travis,” Kravitz said slowly. His voice had taken on the same careful, quiet quality he’d had earlier. “But I hope you understand how-- how rare it is that a soul finds its way through the place between places and emerges as it was in its previous life. Certainly your mother’s energy is here, her bonds and her memories and her love for you, but… I’m sorry, Travis, but it’s very unlikely we would be able to find her in as whole a condition as you currently are.”

 

“Yeah,” Travis said. “Yeah, okay.”  _ There  _ was that familiar sick, sinking feeling he had expected earlier.

 

“I’m sorry, Travis,” Kravitz said again. “I could explain all the logistical business behind it but I doubt it would help. I don’t think I could even explain to you how rare it is for a spirit as… well, as intact as you are to arrive on the shores.”

 

“The  _ Eternal _ Shores,” Travis cracked, trying to cheer himself up.

 

“Sure,” Kravitz agreed, indulging him. “The Eternal Shores. But, in all the cases I’ve seen like yours, the death was traumatic, unexpected, and usually unjust. Are you sure you can’t remember anything that happened before you arrived here?”

 

Travis furrowed his brow, contemplating. Buttercup rolled sleepily onto her back and stared at him until he leaned over and scratched her belly.

 

“Travis?”

 

“I’m thinking.”

 

He struggled to conjure a recollection of what his last hours had looked like. As far as he could tell, it was a normal day. Gradually, images came to him, snapshots surfacing under dark water. Waking up to find Teresa and Bebe already playing in the living room, dropping a kiss on Teresa’s smooth dark hair and another on Bebe’s riotous pigtailed fuzz before making coffee. Dropping them off a few hours later-- where, or for what? More shadows, the images cutting in and out.

 

He pushed at the boundaries of the memory, trying to force himself to remember what he had done, what had happened to him. It was about as effective as squinting to see through a cement wall. He frowned. At some point, he had stopped at home to pick up Buttercup, had changed into a new denim jacket he liked a lot… He shook his head.  _ Not helpful _ , he told himself.

 

Kravitz, at least, seemed sympathetic. “No luck?” he asked.

 

“No, I wish. Ugh! This is so frustrating!”

 

“I understand,” Kravitz said kindly. “I don’t imagine it is very easy to relive the moment your soul was rent from your body wholesale.”

 

“Don’t sound so excited about it,” Travis groused. “Anyway, I can only remember bits and pieces of the day. It’s like… like trying to watch a movie, but I’m standing in the theater parking lot.”

 

This pronouncement was greeted by silence. “That’s probably not very helpful,” he added dejectedly.

 

“Not really,” Kravitz replied, “But it’s alright. Listen, this is not an easy call for me, but…  right now, there’s only one thing I can think of to do.”

 

Travis looked up, meeting his eyes. Their gazes locked for a long moment. Kravitz broke the silence.

 

“I think we need to find a way to get you back.”

 

\--

 

They were on their third pot of tea at least,  Travis now pacing back and forth in the wood-panelled apartment, his afghan-cape fluttering in his wake. By Kravitz’ request, he had spent the better part of an hour trying to construct a timeline of the most significant events and landmarks of the time and place he was from. Kravitz had assured him that this would be the easiest way to triangulate his position at the time of his death as closely as possible.

 

Kravitz, for his part, had posted up on the countertop in the kitchenette area, long legs crossed underneath himself and the Eternal Tome floating in mid-air before him as he flipped pages back and forth, trying to navigate to Cincinatti, 2018.

 

Travis was on his third attempt at trying to explain the difference between World War I and World War II and trying to undo the idea that he had accidentally placed in Kravitz’s head that World War III had recently begun. (“No, come on, I said they didn’t launch the missiles  _ at  _ us, not yet!” Kravitz, ruffled: “Frankly, I would be having a much easier time of it if they had.” Travis, offended: “Whoa, what’s  _ that  _ supposed to mean?!”).

 

Frustrated at his own confusion over Germans and trenches and tanks, he threw his hands up and hauled himself onto the counter besides Kravitz. He peered over Kravitz’s shoulder to try and make out his work in the Tome. “What the…?”

 

Kravitz glanced back at him. At this distance, Travis could see for the first time that his eyes were a very dark violet, and not brown or black as he had previously assumed. “What do you expect?” Kravitz was saying, “I mean, this table of contents  _ does  _ exist in twelve dimensions.”

 

Travis shook his head and rubbed his eyes, surprised all over again at not finding his glasses there as he did so. He blinked, but saw the same sight as before: the Tome, floating in front of them, emanated a field of shimmering light from its pages about a foot in all directions. 

 

As Travis watched, the light shifted from golden to pink to orange and back, continuously, esoteric shapes and symbols passing through the light like falling motes of dust. The light seemed to solidify, then spill, then sublimate back into ethereal smoke the flowed over the surface of the page-- although, on closer inspection, the pages were made of the same formless contained light as the information that shone out of them.

 

“You can read that?” he asked Kravitz, disbelieving.

 

“Of  _ course _ I can,” Kravitz said with a worldly sigh. “Anyway, I think I’ve got it. Are you ready?”

 

“Oh, beans,” Travis said. “Yeah, I mean-- I guess so. Do I look ok?”

 

Kravitz regarded him silently, eyebrows raised.

 

“Okay, I am choosing to take that as a yes. Can I take Buttercup?”

 

Kravitz’s expression turned thoughtful. “I don’t see why not. In for a penny, in for a pound, I guess.”

 

“What does  _ that  _ mean?”

 

For a split second, the impression of a grinning skull flashed over Kravitz’s features, and his eyes burned red. Travis began to scoot backward instinctively, but the image was gone as quickly as it had appeared.

 

“The Raven Queen will not be happy,” Kravitz growled, “but I’ve observed her rules for centuries, even when they make my head spin and my heart heavy. I can help you, Travis, and I  _ want _ to help. It’s been too long since I last let myself pursue anything that felt like justice.”

 

“Oh.” Travis said, after a lengthy pause. “Okay. But, like, your heart,” he went on, wildly aware that he was breaking some kind of mood. “Does it still, like, work, and stuff?”

 

Kravitz met his gaze, his eyes grave. “If my heart could beat, Travis,” he said, “it would break my chest.”

 

\--

 

Interdimensional travel was a little less glamorous than Travis had always envisioned. He’d hoped for space-age doors that slid open like apertures, or an array of mystical crystals like the ones Griffin had described as part of their campaign, or at least an intricately carved Victorian wardrobe they could push through. 

 

What it really looked like was this: Kravitz fussing about his kitchen for five minutes that felt like millennia as he packed snacks and made sure the dishes were all out of the sink. It looked like Travis holding a squirming Buttercup in his arms as the three of them processed out the kitchen, through the cozy living room, down a long narrow hallway that offered only glimpses into bedrooms as gloomy and unused as mausoleums, and out a backdoor into an unadorned courtyard where they could see, suddenly, a setting sun. 

 

It looked like Kravitz shaking back a long sleeve of his robe, the cowl now back up and over his face, and slicing his left index finger through the air in a precise motion.

 

It looked like a rift opening as if in fabric, but through the other side came distant chatter, laughter, and the clatter of servingware. A lamp-like amber glow spilled through the tear, bright in the gloaming of the astral plane, and with it came the smell of burning wood and spilled beer.

 

“Um,” Travis said, “This is a little less glamorous than I had a--”

 

And then Kravitz’s cold hand circled his wrist and he and Buttercup were being pulled through.

 

There was no bodily sensation, which surprised him, and although he could not remember his death he had at least expected the act of un-dying to feel a little more dramatic. It was as though he had stepped from behind a curtain into a brighter room, nothing more. It was familiar to him-- not least the thrill of it, the moment echoing every first appearance of every play he’d ever been in, every live show he’d ever recorded.

 

_ Lights up. Act two. Let’s go. _

 

He found himself squeezing his eyes shut as he stepped through, wanting to drink in the first moment of his reintroduction as deeply as he could.

 

And then they were through. Kravitz dropped his hand, and Travis opened his eyes, heart soaring.

 

He blinked.

 

He blinked again, shuffling Buttercup in his arms so he could rub his eyes.

 

No, there was nothing wrong with his vision; whatever Kravitz had done back on the beach to fix his eyesight was apparently enough to carry over between planes. So what was happening?

 

“Uh, Krav,” he said. “Did you teleport us to a Medieval Times?”

 

They stood in a shadowed back corner of what Travis could now see was an old-fashioned bar. It was filled with people, virtually all men, and white men at that; the crowd was subdued but not silent. The strangest part, though, was their costumes. They were all dressed in some variation of a long jackets, waistcoats, cravats, and short pants with tall stockings or boots.

 

“Uh,   _ no _ ,” Kravitz said. “This is America! … Right?”

 

Travis was wracking his brain trying to remember every History of Costume class he’d ever had to take as part of his Theatre degree. These outfits weren’t medieval, they were--

 

“Excuse me!” Travis shouted to the nearest person, pushing his way past tables and chairs. He stumbled and, looking down, realized he’d somehow been outfitted similarly to others in the room, his toes squeezed into narrow patent leather loafers. “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he muttered.

 

He’d made his way to a circle of standing people, all of whom were looking shocked at his intrusion. He caught the arm of the man closest to him. “Excuse me!” he said. “Hi! You! What’s the date?”

 

In a strange, stiff accent, the man answered, “October the 17th, my boy.”

 

“Yeah, yeah, cool,” Travis responded, shaking his arm just a little, “But what  _ year? _ ”

 

The attention of his audience, however, was interrupted by shouts and noises from outside. Travis rushed to the front of the bar with the rest of the crowd, all straining to see what was causing the commotion. He cursed the thick, warped glass on the narrow windows, nearly so dimpled as to obscure the scene on the other side.

 

He was only able to catch a glimpse of red, what looked like a very short parade, and then his vision was completely blocked by the crowd in the bar as they suddenly erupted into whoops and cheers. The men were spinning away from the window, grinning, seizing their friends by hands and shoulders, some weeping.

 

“Kravitz!” Travis screamed over the sudden din, “What is  _ GOING ON? _ ”

 

Kravitz was there behind him then, throwing an arm around his shoulders and steering him out of the thick of the crowd and through the heavy wooden door, into the street.

 

The cold hit Travis, bracing, and he realized distantly that the Colonialist fantasy he’d taken as theme decor inside the bar extended outside and all along the storefronts down boths sides of the street. But there, in the middle of the muddy rutted dirt road, was a somber boy with a drum, and behind him a skinny young man in a ragged red coat and a white handkerchief held delicately aloft.

 

“Oh shit,” Travis said. “Oh my fuck. Kravitz!”

 

He turned. Kravitz was looking sheepish but clearly was making every effort to keep up a cool facade. “What?” he replied innocently. “Is this, er… is this the wrong… town?”

 

“Yeah, you could say that,” Travis said, almost laughing. “Kravitz! You think I haven’t seen  _ Hamilton _ ? Come on! I  _ know  _ Lin-Manuel! I mean, seriously!”

 

He was rambling, he knew it, trying to bite down the wild laughter that threatened to claw up through his throat. Kravitz’ performance of confidence had quickly turned to curiosity. Apparently Lin’s musical hadn’t made it to the astral plane, then.  _ Whatever _ .

 

Calming himself, he grabbed Kravitz’s arm and pulled him close. “Look, we are  _ way _ off. Like  _ super  _ off! By like three centuries-- or, fuck, I hate math, two and a half centuries! WAY OFF, Kravitz!”

 

“Okay, okay,” Kravitz said, taking hold of Travis by the shoulders. “Okay! So I was a little off! Just-- just be cool for a second, we’ll work it out!”

 

“C’monnn,” Travis whined. Then he realized-- “Shit! Hold on, I gotta get Buttercup.”

 

He rushed back into the tavern and was relieved to find Buttercup next to the table where they had first stepped through. Buttercup, for her part, had relieved herself  _ under _ the table.

 

“No time for puppy eyes, Butt,” Travis said, scooping her up, “It’s cool, it’s like seventeen eighty-something, all the people here probably poop under tables too. Let’s go.”

 

\--

 

Interdimensional travel, it turned out, did not get more glamorous on the second go. 

 

Kravitz guided them into an alleyway, dodging celebratory colonists, and tore a portal back to the astral plane. Travis was almost glad to leave the smell and chaos of early America behind, though as he tumbled back onto the soft sands of the astral plane he felt a pang for his relative proximity for the life he’d left behind.

 

Dusting himself off, he said to Kravitz. “I can’t believe you landed me in Yorktown.”

 

Kravitz shrugged. “Is that where we wound up? I have to say, I don’t travel like that too much. Picking a target is more of an art than a science.”

 

“Yeah, okay, but like, we  _ were  _ at least two hundred and-- thirty?-- two hundred and thirty years off. That’s kind of a lot.”

 

“To you, maybe.”

 

“Oh right, play the eternity card, whatever.”

 

They trudged back to Kravitz’s quarters, Travis carrying his ridiculous, toe-pinching pilgrim shoes and Kravitz holding an anxious Buttercup wrapped up in his cloak. It wasn’t raining, which was nice, though it was fully night.

 

“Hey Kravitz,” Travis said, breaking an easy silence that had fallen between them. “Quick question for you. What’d you do to my eyes?”

 

“Oh, that,” Kravitz said. “It’s nothing really. Just-- well, since I have dominion over the material aspect of this plane, I can make little adjustments like that to ease things along, for myself or-- more rarely-- others.” He surveyed Travis over his shoulders. “It’s a good look for you, you know. Besides, most planes haven’t really grasped optometry yet. It’s not something I’d be in a position to provide. Practically speaking.”

 

“Oh, but you’re good with practicing some casual magic to, like, permanently alter my physiology. Yeah. Got it.”

 

They’d reached the front door. Kravitz held it open, smiling a little. Travis couldn’t help but notice that the grin came easier for him now.

  
“What do you expect,” he said, “I  _ am  _ the Grim Reaper.”


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kravitz does his best to bring a theory to life. Travis goes through the looking glass. Buttercup picks a side. A pattern is revealed.

 

Dawn in the astral plane came cold and clear, and Travis found himself abruptly awake on Kravitz’s chintz sofa. He’d been so exhausted after their failed mission the night before that he’d fallen asleep in the Colonial apparel which Kravitz’s dimensional portal had somehow provided him, too tired even to ask why it didn’t disappear like his own clothes had when he first crossed over.

 

At some point, Kravitz must have tucked him in; he was fairly buried in a mound of the homemade blankets he’d seen strewn around the room when he arrived.

 

“Oh good,” came Kravitz’s voice, “You’re up.”

 

Travis shifted, hauling himself halfway up and peering blearily over the back of the couch. Kravitz had just come through the front door, Buttercup trotting happily at his heels. He held a mug of something steaming and, incongruously, a rolled-up newspaper.

 

“Hngh,” was all Travis managed in reply. He blinked, still drowsing. “Not up.” Kravitz laughed and Travis heard him shut the door and move about the kitchen. Buttercup jumped onto Travis’ feet and he leaned forward to scratch her ears, then tried unsuccessfully to push her away as she licked his face. 

 

“I hope you slept well!” Kravitz continued, pulling out his enamel tea kettle and shuffling for something in a cupboard. “Hopefully you didn’t get too cold.” Travis looked again at the metric ton of blankets that anchored him to the couch and yawned. 

 

“I know you humans tend to like to be warm, but, like--  _ how  _ warm? You know?” Kravitz was now stoking the fire in the woodstove, the tea kettle beginning to whistle merrily from atop it. “I mean,  _ I  _ don’t know. Humans are usually cold by the time I get ‘em! So anyway, you’re awake and alive-- well, I mean… you know,  _ here _ \-- so I can’t have mucked it up too badly.”

 

“Uh huh,” Travis managed.

 

Then Kravitz took the kettle away again and began tinkering with something on the kitchen counter, and a wonderfully familiar smell reached him. 

 

“ _ Coffee _ ?” Travis croaked, suddenly finding the motivation to throw off his myriad blankets and struggle to an upright position.

 

Kravitz looked surprised. “Oh! You have coffee, where you were?” he carried a cup over and handed it to Travis. “I’ll be honest, I kind of hoped you’d never had it before so I could blow your mind.”

 

“It’s still blowing my mind,” Travis assured him, bringing his whole face down to inhale the steam. “Uh, Kravitz? Do you still have any of those snacks that you brought to the Battle of Yorktown?”

 

“Oh! Food! Sure, of course, hang on.” and Kravitz crossed back into the kitchen, banging cupboards and thumping down utensils. “I wasn’t sure if food was still gonna be a thing for you. You like eggs?”

 

“Sure,” Travis said. As an afterthought, he clarified, “Chicken eggs?”

 

Kravitz turned and gave him a reproving look. “Yes, of course,  _ chicken _ eggs.”

 

Travis gave him a thumbs up. Kravitz returned the gesture clumsily, confused. “Hey Kravitz,” Travis said, “Question for you: if you crack an egg into a bowl, is it still an egg?”

 

“I-- what?”

 

“Like, is the egg what’s in the shell, or is it the shell itself, or is an egg only the two things when they’re both existing together?”

 

“Honestly, Travis,” Kravitz sighed, “I can’t really afford to indulge in those kind of ontological queries in my line of work.”

 

\--

 

“Where’d you get this?” Travis asked, mouth full of scrambled eggs. He nudged the newspaper.

 

“From Barry,” Kravitz said. He apparently did not need to eat and had been watching Travis, fascinated.

 

“You-- did you go see Barry Bluejeans? Like, today?”

 

Kravitz shrugged and stretched, folding one leg underneath him. “We visit occasionally,” he said noncommittally.

 

“Okay, but how do you get there? You couldn’t even land me in the right century when we tried yesterday.”

 

“Well, alright, I see what you’re saying, but-- with Barry, well-- I’ve been there before, I suppose.”

 

“Oh, so you just go on a little interplanar jaunt every now and again, I gotcha. Gotta practice up just in case someone is trying to, I don’t know, get back to their goddamn home world or something.”

 

“Are you being sarcastic?”

 

“Uh,  _ yeah _ ! And you’re being kind of cagey. So, can you just level with me?”

 

Kravitz’s patience was clearly wearing thin, and Travis wondered-- not for the first time-- how long it had been since Kravitz had had this much contact with another living soul. Well, with another soul, at least.

“If you must know, Barry’s native plane is the same world I grew up in. When I was alive. It has been rather hard for me to forget my way home, though for many years I did try.”

 

Travis, abashed, did not reply for several long moments. He had not spared much time to think of Kravitz as a living man, his own person, being as he was so consumed with the ache to get back home to his family and the life he had left behind.

 

“I’m sorry, Kravitz,” he said at last. “I didn’t-- I was being selfish. I just miss… uh, everything, I guess? I just really really want to go back. I wish… I don’t mean to sound insensitive, and I’m, like, I’m really sorry if I do, but I wish I could find  _ my  _ way back home as easily.”

 

Kravitz gave him a tight smile. “It’s a mixed blessing,” he muttered, not without humor.

 

“Should we try again?” Travis asked him.

 

Kravitz cleared his throat and sat up straighter, unrolling the newspaper and smoothing it out on the table with both hands. Travis noticed that what he had taken to be a mundane, rolled newspaper was in fact a thin parchment scroll with columns of compact newsprint and blackletter headings. “Fantasy Times?” he cracked, and Kravitz pretended delicately not to hear.

 

“When speaking with Barry today, he gave me the idea that you may be adrift here in the astral plane because your unfinished business has something to do with a fixed point in history-- or future history, if you will.” Kravitz picked up his salt shaker and placed it on the unrolled newspaper, then produced a pen out of thin air and drew a series of wavy arrows all converging on a circle he drew around the base of the shaker. The pepper grinder was set a few inches away and given similar treatment. He glanced back at Travis expectantly.

 

“Fixed points,” Travis repeated, watching him. “There’s a Doctor Who episode about this, I think.”

 

“Doctor Who?”

 

“Yep, that’s the joke!” He laughed. Kravitz didn’t.

 

“Uh, alright. Anyway, there are fixed points like this in history, and they act as-- as wayfinders, I guess, or goal posts. Depending on what role you’re playing in the making of the history. Anyway, they are incorruptible, and whether they benefit more people or hurt them, they are part of the fabric of time. They are always already established, even if the path may differ to reach them.” Kravitz shook his head. “I always thought this was theoretical, just philosophical things people wrote about when they had too much time on their hands.”

 

“Or  _ read  _ about when they have too much time on their hands,” Travis pointed out. “I mean, I don’t want to dunk on you, but--” he gestured toward the hand-knit afghans, the hand-painted watercolors, and the imperfectly hand-sculpted mug, now full of coffee, which sat in front of him.

 

“Just because I have dominion over matter itself doesn’t mean I always take the easy way, Travis,” Kravitz sniffed. “And yes, I have read a lot of philosophy. You probably would have, too, if  _ you’d  _ lived past your thirties.”

 

“Burn!” Travis said, and laughed again. Somehow it was easier to get roasted by the grim reaper than it was to actually acknowledge how much time on earth his death had cost him.

 

“Anyway,” Kravitz went on. “I told Barry about our-- uh, detour, yesterday. He thought maybe my ability to travel between planes was compromised by bringing a mortal passenger. He suggested that we would be limited to waypoints within your reality, and furthermore that I would likely have better luck if I sought those waypoints out intentionally rather than stumbling into them by chance.

 

“Unfortunately,” Kravitz continued, reaching into a satchel he’d set on the floor next to his chair and pulling out a few more scrolls and a heavy cloth-bound book, “that means I have rather more research to do to try and approach your relative time and place from the opposite direction-- working backward from what we know of the fixed future.”

 

“Wow!” Travis said. “Can you, uh, do that? Like, do you already  _ know _ the future?”

 

“Not precisely,” Kravitz said with a tight smile. “But Barry had previously done some work within his agency-- they study theoretical planar travel-- to create an algorithm that built out likely dates and places for the next fixed event, based on what we know of the established multiplanar fixed points of the past.”

 

“He sounds super smart!” Travis said, impressed. “Aww, Barry. What a good boy.”

 

“He is, at that. Given his previous research, he proposed that these waypoints, once found, could be used like train stations-- oh, er. Do you have trains, where you’re from?”

 

“Sure do!” Travis said. “And elevators. A lot of people said we shouldn’t have shared that particular technology with you folks, but you know how it is. Public opinion on elevators always goes up and down.”

 

For the first time all morning, Kravitz laughed along with him.

 

\--

 

Realizing that he was probably going to be more of a hindrance than a help as Kravitz tried to riddle out the most significant moments of earth’s future history, Travis busied himself folding every blanket he could find and washing the dishes. 

 

When that didn’t take enough time, he changed back into Barry’s blue jeans and took Buttercup for a walk, throwing pebbles into the rainbow waves for her to try and retrieve. They circumnavigated the island together, Buttercup sometimes pausing to sniff the sand or listen to the distant moans of the incarcerated souls within the Eternal Stockade, the two of them occasionally splashing in the surf of the prismatic ocean. 

 

Eventually they made it back to Kravitz’s quarters, where they found his tall form bent over the Eternal Tome again, its pages sparking erratically from red to yellow to green and blue.

 

“That doesn’t look good!” Travis said.

 

Kravitz sat bolt upright, startled. He’d fallen back to his skeletal form, either out of shock or from the frustration of searching fruitlessly through the Tome.

 

“Oh  _ shit _ ,” Travis said, “ _ that  _ is not a good look either.”

 

Kravitz reached a ghastly hand to his skull, realizing the change, and in the blink of an eye he had returned to his natural face, his hands once again covered in thickly clustered tattoos of black feathers.

 

“There’s the handsome devil I know and love!”

 

Kravitz blushed then, unexpectedly, and turned back to the book, grumbling, “I am  _ not  _ a devil.”

 

Travis leaned on the counter beside him. “Fair enough. Any luck with the ET?”

 

“Not so far,” Kravitz said, still not looking at him. “Sorry I don’t have anything for you yet. Feel free to keep poking around. Just don’t go in the Stockade.”

 

“O-kay,” Travis replied. “But I mean, seriously, was not even considering it. It’s not exactly inviting.”

 

He was greeted by silence, and so he sighed, and wandered back into the living room. He had tidied it up already, and short of beating the rugs he couldn’t think what else to do in that regard. He continued his wander down the hall, peeking into each room as he went.

 

They were, largely, unused, except for a an inviting-looking study panelled in a richer wood than the rest of the apartment and lined floor-to-ceiling with books. A worn green armchair sat beside a small fireplace, above which hung a lovingly painted oil portrait of a beautiful middle-aged Black woman-- Kravitz’s mother, almost certainly, if their shared warm eyes and knife-sharp cheekbones were any indication. Sensing the privacy of the chamber, Travis edged his way back out.

 

He came next to an old-fashioned bathroom, which he was very pleased to make the acquaintance of, though the pull-chain flush mechanism gave him some trouble. He washed his hands and checked himself out in the small oval mirror above the sink basin.

 

He attempted a big, open smile, the kind he usually reserved for fan photos or selfies, but even in the warped old mirror he could tell that it didn’t reach his eyes. 

 

He peered at himself closer. It was somewhat novel, to be able to see his own face so clearly without glasses, and he examined it closely for any clues to his deadness. He shrugged when he found nothing, and swept his hair back.

 

“Feeling cute!” he said to his reflection, but the words felt hollow and forced. 

 

He suddenly wondered if it was morning on earth, if Teresa was standing in front of a bathroom mirror right now too, fixing her hair or putting on makeup. 

 

He wondered if she knew yet that he was dead, if maybe he was still just missing and she was worrying over him. 

 

He wondered if Bebe had realized her papa hadn’t come home when he should have-- if she had cried-- if Teresa had been alone to try and calm her. 

 

He turned away from his reflection, pained and helpless. He wished he could help. He wished he could just be  _ with _ them.

 

Knowing the tears had already started coming and would not stop coming, Travis pushed his way to the end of the hall and out into the courtyard from which they’d traveled the night before.

 

The sun was getting high and it was, really, a lovely day; the fact that the courtyard was filled with blooming plants did not escape him, though he did not dwell much on the irony of Kravitz being apparently a deft gardener and cultivator of living things. He found his way to a bench and allowed himself to weep, the sound of his sobs swallowed by the lush greenery.

 

He hadn’t marked the time passing, but looked up at some point through tired eyes to realize that much of the garden had fallen into shadow, the sun having sunk somewhere behind the high stone walls. He stood, brushing himself off, and turned to go back in.

 

He was surprised to see Kravitz on a bench near the door, chin dropped to his chest, fast asleep. Buttercup was curled up into a little knot of dog at his crossed ankles.

 

Travis pushed aside the jealousy he felt at having apparently been replaced by Kravitz in Buttercup’s esteem, and reached out to shake him gently by the shoulder.

 

He came to almost immediately, stuttering apologies, and for the second time that day Travis saw a deep blush creep over his features.

 

“Hey, bud,” Travis said. “Whatcha doin’ out here?”

 

Kravitz held up the Eternal Tome, then flipped it around and tapped its cover sharply. The book fell open, floating from his hands and suspending itself in front of him. Sparks trailed from its pages as they shuffled themselves back and forth. Kravitz snapped his fingers and they abruptly settled. Travis sat down beside him on the bench, craning over his shoulder to try and peer into the book alongside him.

 

“I wanted to tell you, I think I found your closest waypoint.”

 

“My train station?”

 

“That’s right,” he agreed, “but I didn’t want to-- uh, I didn’t want to interrupt you--”

 

“No, it’s fine,” Travis said, battling back a blush of his own. “It’s-- I mean, I’m a crier! But also, like, you know-- I’m dead. So there’s that. And,” he shrugged, feeling himself start to well up again.

 

“I understand,” Kravitz said solemnly. “Not to be grave, but I have died before as well.”

 

“Zing!” Travis chuckled, glad for a distraction. Kravitz looked confused.

 

“Not to be grave? … Aw, come on, I thought you were all up on the puns.”

 

Kravitz cracked a smile, wide enough that his gold-cap tooth flashed. “Fair enough,” he said, and a trace of jollity had returned to his tone.

 

“So, you think you have my station.”

 

“That’s right.”

 

“Any reason to wait?”

 

“None at all.”

 

Travis scooped up Buttercup, who protested sleepily and stretched in his arms. “Let’s go.”

 

\--

 

When they stepped out of the rift Kravitz had drawn, they found themselves in a posh office lobby. Plate glass windows gleamed from all sides, and through a hazy sunset Travis could make out the familiar skyline of Los Angeles.

 

“Oh, shit!” he said in a hushed tone. He set down Buttercup to grab Kravitz’s hand and drag him over to the glass. They stared out together at the countless windows and signs and street-lights shimmering against the darkness, Mulholland Drive unwinding in neon restlessness below them.

 

“Wow,” Kravitz breathed beside him. “This is-- is this home for you?”

 

“It sure is,” Travis said, joy expanding almost painfully in his chest. He felt like he was made of air. His blood seemed to sing with the relief and comfort and excitement of being back, of being  _ home _ \-- well, not home, not precisely, but in the right world, just a plane ride away from everyone he’d ever loved.

 

“It’s… marvelous,” Kravitz said. “And terrifying. Are all of those moving lights some kind of machine?”

 

“Cars, yeah,” Travis said. Kravitz pulled his eyes away from the scenery and Travis could feel his gaze on him.

 

“I did not know you came from a robit world.”

 

Travis laughed outright. “I’ll kill Griffin for making that canon. Not literally! Sorry, you don't get him yet. But it’s actually pronounced  _ ro-bot _ . Now come on!” He grabbed Kravitz’s hand again. “Let’s find ourselves a phone.”

 

\--

 

The receptionist was a blonde man who was so smooth-- from his hair to his chin to his neat satin shirt-- that Travis thought for a moment he  _ was _ a robot. Then he frowned, and asked coldly how he could help them.

 

Travis suddenly felt grubby, remembering abruptly that he had left the astral plane still half in his Colonial garb, barefoot, the flouncy blouse tucked into his borrowed blue jeans. He reached up to pat down the ruffles of his shirt, and was met instead with the smooth weft of fine merino wool. He glanced down.

 

“ _ Niiice, _ ” he murmured to Kravitz. As before, the journey through the planes had garbed them in the clothing appropriate to their era, and he now found himself in a very sharp blue-grey suit. He could see that it was a hyper-trendy cut, the jacket having neither buttons nor lapel, and the straight-legged trousers ending a good four inches above the ankle. The mysterious stylings of the planar rift had completed the outfit with burgundy suede ankle boots and pale silk socks that matched the blush florals of his oxford shirt. A straight, slender length of silk in a dark burgundy-and-charcoal plaid hung untied on either side of his neck, weighted in place with silver points at its ends. 

 

He smoothed a hand over his hair, thought  _ feeling cute! _ with a conviction he’d previously lacked, and turned back to the blonde receptionist.

 

“Yes, hello,” he said, as loftily as he could. “Can we use your phone?”

 

The man sneered. “We here at Starbuck-Helles are not in the business of lending out our equipment to junkies off of the street.”

 

“We’re not-- wait, you here at  _ what _ ?”

 

“Starbuck-Helles Enterprise? The corporate offices of which-- in which--where you  _ are _ , currently?” Seeing Travis’ and Kravitz’s twin blank looks, the flustered receptionist rolled his eyes, threw up his hands, and shooed them toward a projected video against a sculpted half-wall in the middle of the room. 

 

The display was scrolling information at a leisurely pace, following some kind of timeline. They watched as the animation traveled from “1971: the first Starbucks opens in Seattle, Washington, FFA,” to “2016: historic global merger of Anheuser-Busch InBev and SABMiller,” to “2024: Amazon acquires Anheuser-Busch InBev SABMiller; renamed as the Helles Corporation,” to “2030: Starbuck-Helles Enterprise is formed upon completed merger between world’s largest corpo-political superpowers.”

 

“Uh oh,” Travis said.

 

The projected animation ended, and for a moment the half-wall returned to just a lump of weird corporate office art; then the video started up again, this time from the beginning.

 

“WELCOME!” it said, “You now stand in the Universal Headquarters of Historic Corpo-Political Entity, the Starbuck-Helles Corporation.

 

“From its humble beginnings as disparate consumer companies seeking to overturn to cruel human needs of sleep and sobriety, to its astounding and unbounded technological advancements, to its historic rise to power and critical role in forming global superpower the Federated Feudalities of America, Starbuck-Helles has always lead the way in improving the quality of existence itself.

 

“Our brave pioneering leader asked the question in everyone’s hearts, which no one had yet dared to answer: when all human needs have been met and all desires satisfied, what is left?” The video went momentarily dark, then--

 

“POWER,” appeared in sparkling dark-rainbow font. More words scrolled onto the screen. “The ultimate power can only come once we have overcome death itself!”

 

The words  _ A MESSAGE FROM OUR LEADER  _ flashed on the screen and Travis tore his eyes away from the bizarre video. Kravitz, beside him, was perfectly still, his mouth set in a hard line. He looked almost like he was going to cry, but as Travis leaned into him he realized that the redness around his eyes was the ghostly vestige of the red flames that burned in the sockets of his eyes when he went skeletal.

 

“Hey, Kravitz,” Travis said in a low voice, trying not to sound panicked. “I think it’s probably best if you can hold it together right now. Can you do that?” Kravitz did not respond. His eyes flickered, brighter.

 

“Um, okay. I know  _ you _ know this, and I don’t want to freak you out, but I think… well, it  _ is _ earth, my earth, but I mean. The time is wrong. Something’s wrong. This is a bad scene. Right? I think maybe we should get out of here.”

 

“Overcome death itself,” Kravitz hissed. “The audacity! The hubris.” He turned eyes to Travis, the light behind them growing sharper and brighter with each moment. “This is your world, Travis McElroy?” he spat, his voice rising in anger. “You sought my favor, only to lead me to an era of such profound arrogance that they would seek to overturn my rule?”

 

His eyes flared red and in an instant he had transformed into the Reaper figure Travis had first seen on the beach, death’s head lit ominously by the embers of his eyes, cowled in flowing inky robes that swirled into mist. From nowhere, too, came an enormous scythe, forming itself from shadow.

 

“No, Kravitz, no, I swear--”

 

“Holy  _ SHIT _ ,” came the shocked voice of the smooth receptionist. A rushed sequence of tones came from his desk and Travis heard him muttering hysterically: “Security, security, please-- we’ve got a code-- a code--  _ fuck!  _ I don’t know what the code is, but he’s here! He’s here! Somebody tell the boss!”

 

Kravitz, undaunted by the sudden commotion, was bearing down on Travis now. “I should never have let you stay.” His voice was unfamiliar, as heavy and deadly as flint on steel.

 

“Please, Kravitz,” Travis begged, grabbing him by the shoulders. “I swear I knew nothing about this! I sw--”

 

He was cut off by a pair of strong hands at his own shoulders as he was suddenly yanked backward and restrained, arms twisted up behind his back. He craned his neck to see he had been grabbed by a tall, broad-shouldered woman with a shaved head and a dark tactical uniform. She looked as surprised as Travis himself, but she spared him only a glance before returning her awestruck stare to Kravitz.

 

Following her gaze, Travis saw that three more security guards had surrounded Kravitz. One held a small handgun, another an extended baton. The third simply stood dumbfounded, defensive stance forgotten, as they stared open mouthed at the massive specter of Death in front of them.

 

Kravitz snarled at them, both hands holding his scythe at the ready. He roared wordlessly as two of the guards advanced, sweeping out the legs of the one holding the baton, sending her sprawling, and following up with a vicious slice across the back as she fell.

 

He spun and faced the next combatant, even as the gun trembled in their unsteady hands. He raised his scythe again, crackling violet energy wreathing his hands and dancing up to the blade.

 

Just  before he struck, a voice cut through the room.

 

“Stand down!” it barked. “Guards, drop your weapons! As your Captain I order you to stand  _ down! _ ” At once, the three guards dropped their hands to their sides. Travis was released as his guard snapped to attention. Even the guard on the ground fluttered her hand in a weak salute, raising her head. 

 

Travis rubbed his arms gingerly and snuck a glance at Kravitz; he was irate, scythe held in battle stance before him, but he now stood still and watchful as a statue.

 

The Captain was broader than he was tall, short-limbed and hugely muscled with a close, square crop of grey hair. He held an assault rifle across his chest and, seeing that the fight had come to a stop, barked, “ _ Present,  _ ARMS!” in a manner that Travis had thought only existed in movies. Each standing guard jumped to identical salutes.

 

The Captain himself then saluted,  stepped aside, and turned ninety degrees to face a man that Travis had not even noticed, who had entered the room just behind him.

 

The man was tall, middle-aged but good-looking and meticulously groomed. He shot the cuffs of his elegant suit, tugged his lapels into place, and brushed an invisible wisp from one shoulder. This done, he turned a broad and dazzling smile to the two of them.

 

“You must be Kravitz,” he said warmly. “I’ve heard so much about you. I just can’t  _ tell  _ you how pleased I am that you’re here.”

 

He walked forward, extending a manicured hand. “Welcome to Starbuck-Helles,” he said. “My name is John.”


	4. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kravitz and Travis are surprised by the familiarity of a bad situation. Buttercup refuses to be a rat. A deal is not struck, and Griffin is not there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone-- First, thank you so much for all of the incredible comments (and kudos!) you all have been leaving! It's been so much fun to bring this idea to life and knowing that it is reaching others in the community truly brings me joy. Second, it's gonna get a lil dark for our boys for a hot minute but rest assured everyone will pull through. And third, if you're curious, I am planning to update every Friday, but sometimes I'll be a little early (like last week's Thursday night chapter) or a little late (like, uh... right now). :) Thanks so much for being here. Enjoy!

Kravitz stared at the hand John had extended to him, then back up at the man’s face.

 

“How the  _ fuck _ do you know my name?”

 

John’s laugh was barely contained by the white picket fence of his celebrity-straight teeth.  _ He looks like an advertisement for boat shoes _ , Travis thought.  _ Forget that, he looks like an ad for the yacht itself _ .

 

“Oh, my friend,” John said jovially. “I think you will find I know much more about you than just your name. Now, are you going to come with me willingly?” He pushed his open hand toward Kravitz again, still waiting to shake.

 

With Kravitz’ face still in its skeletal state it was hard to tell if he was attempting a smile or simply baring his teeth. The effect was the same, regardless. He slapped his bony hand into John’s palm and sparks of energy spiraled and snaked from his wrist up John’s arm. John’s eyes went went wide, his jaw set, but he said nothing and stood his ground. A moment passed, the electricity fading away, and John dropped the handshake at last.

 

“Now, why would you do a thing like that?” he asked cordially, but he spoke through gritted teeth. He jerked his chin at the personal guard who had entered with him. “Ron,” he said softly. “I believe you know the protocol.”

 

“Code Jet,” the Captain barked. The guards, standing at attention, drew their weapons in unison, leveling each one at Kravitz. Travis felt the cold nose of a gun barrel press between his shoulder blades. He didn’t dare turn to look at the woman holding him; he hardly ventured to breathe.

 

“So sorry for the inconvenience,” John said, and Captain Ron opened fire.

 

From where he was standing, Travis saw the spray of bullets from the Captain’s  assault rifle go right through Kravitz, but Kravitz only flinched briefly at the noise. He stayed on his feet, standing straight, the burning pits of his eyes never leaving John’s face. Travis could have sworn Kravitz was smiling. Travis could not understand how he was so composed; his own heart hammered painfully and he fairly dripped with a cold sweat.

 

“Come now, don’t be like that!” John called over the cacophony of gunshots and clattering ammunition literally floor. He held his left hand up and the Captain ceased fire as immediately as he had begun it.

 

John looked then at Travis, a smile returning slowly to his handsome features. “So you are impervious to our firepower,” he said to Kravitz. He kept his tone light. “But is your friend?”

 

One quick nod to the guard behind Travis, and the gun barrel moved from his back to his temple. The guard dropped his wrists and instead locked her arm around his chest in a half nelson hold.

 

Travis looked desperately at Kravitz and, for the briefest second, he would have sworn he saw a flicker of panicked humanity in the flames of his eyes. In an instant, though, Kravitz had turned back to John and shrugged. “If you really think killing him is going to get him out of my custody, you’re to stupid for me to even treat with you.” His accent had come back and it saturated every word in spite.

 

“Ah, Mr. Kravitz. What an excellent point.” The last thing Travis saw was John, giving another curt nod to the woman holding him, and then he felt the butt of her gun strike his temple and he blacked out.

 

\--

 

He came to in a conference room, hands bound behind the back of a wheeled office chair. His head felt muzzy and he tried to remember what he knew about concussions.  _ I shouldn’t have been out for more than a couple seconds,  _ he thought.  _ I think I remember hearing it was just narrative laziness when a blackout lasted long enough for the plot to move along. Did Sydnee tell me that? No, maybe… I think she told me if a character was knocked unconscious for more than a few seconds, they’d probably already be dead. _

 

_ Oh wait, _ he thought.

 

He wondered if he could still get concussions as a corpse. Was he a corpse? A revenant? He had physical form, but if he had already died, then what would the ramifications of his death be now?

 

_ Hopefully I won’t have to find out _ . He twisted in his neck, trying to see his restraints, and immediately felt a sharp pain under his ear. “FUCK! What the...?”

 

Gingerly, he lowered his head sideways onto his shoulder, trying to explore the area where he’d felt the stab of pain as carefully as possible. A moment later, another twinge, and he realized there was something protruding from the skin of his neck.

 

“Ah! You’re up.” John’s voice came from behind him as he stepped into Travis’ field of view,  his appearance punctuated by the sound of the door slamming shut. “ _ So  _ sorry we had to give you a little, ah-- social lubricant. Let me get that for you.” Deft fingers reached past Travis’ beard and plucked out a small, needle-tipped cartridge.

 

“Ow! What the fuck? That  _ hurt _ !”

 

John chuckled. “I’m sure it did. A lucky side effect of the tranquilizer.” Without warning he kicked Travis in the shin, hard, the tip of his expensive-looking shoes driving into the bone. Travis yelped. John, still chuckling, straightened his tie and took a seat. He surveyed Travis, amusement twinkling in his eyes. He leaned back and cleared his throat.

 

“Before I drill into who the hell you think you are and what you’re doing in my offices, let me compliment you on your choice of company!”

 

Travis stayed silent, neck and leg both throbbing. A boulder of a headache was beginning to build behind his eyes.

 

“I’m sure you didn’t know this, of course, when you broke in,” John went on. “But we’ve had teams out looking for your friend Mr. Kravitz for quite some time now. And to think--!”

 

He was interrupted by a knock at the door. Travis heard the door open but couldn’t turn to see who it was.

 

“Hi, John,” came a nervous voice. Travis recognized it as that of the smooth receptionist, though the snarky lilt of his tone was flattened in sycophancy. “Um, these guys brought in this-- uh-- like, rat?-- with them? I wasn’t sure if you wanted it.”

 

There was a thump and a small cry, and a moment later Buttercup was at Travis’ ankles, whining, sniffing the legs of his fancy suit. She looked up at him, barked softly, and wriggled on her haunches for a second before launching herself full force into his lap. Hands bound, he couldn’t push her away her sympathetic face licks. She did not seem to mind.

 

Travis heard the door shut again. John surveyed him and Buttercup for a moment, his nose wrinkled in such a way as to suggest something unpleasant had just been placed beneath it. “I take it that’s yours,” he said flatly.

 

Some part of him wanted to laugh, but in the moment Travis was too overwhelmed with pain and confusion and outright exhaustion to speak. John pushed his chair out and walked to them. He reached his hand out tentatively and touched Buttercup’s fur. She ceased licking Travis’ face for long enough to turn doleful eyes on him.

 

“Is she-- is she your familiar?” John asked tentatively. He scratched the top of Buttercup’s head. She allowed it, though her tail did not wag.

 

“Familiar? No,” Travis responded. He was too guarded to allow any emotion to creep into his voice. In his head, he was screaming for John to back away-- fucking with him was one thing, but his  _ dog _ ? Not a chance. “She’s just my pet.”

 

“Pet?” John looked thoughtful. He lifted Buttercup under her front legs, pulling her to him and cradling her wiry form against his chest. She pulled her head away to look at him. Travis strained against his bonds to try and roll the chair towards them. John lifted a foot, landing it squarely on the seat of the chair between Travis’ knees, stopping his movement without even looking up.

 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he said.

 

“Just don’t hurt her!” Travis said. He couldn’t keep the note of pleading out of his voice. Buttercup had been his one comfort, the sole reminder of home, since this whole bullshit journey had started. His heart ached.

 

“It’s fine,” John said dismissively. He sat down with Buttercup in his lap. She rolled her eyes to Travis, so hard she could see the whites, and the long hair of her eyebrows rose as if to say ‘really? This guy?’

 

“I had a pet once,”John mused. “A cat, an orange tabby.” One side of his mouth quirked up in a smile. He met Travis’ eyes.

 

“You see, I have certain… abilities.  I haven’t always. I built them myself, like I’ve built everything I have. Everything you see.”

 

“Sure,” Travis couldn’t resist saying, “With just, what? A small million-dollar-loan from your father?”

 

John looked at him oddly, then smirked. “Ah,” he said. “I see. A historian! No, I am afraid I am than less interested in the presidential missteps of the Feudalities’ past.”

 

“The Feudalities?”  Travis interrupted. “Oh wait, yeah. You’re-- you made the US the-- what was it? FIFA?”

 

“That’s a soccer league,” John said.

 

“--FAA?”

 

“Aviation administration,” John dismissed impatiently.

 

“FDA?”

 

“Alright, no. I’m not playing this game. It’s the FFA, the Federated Feudalities of America, and I worked hard to reclaim the states from their antiquated boundaries. Actually,” he went on, “It’s funny you bring up Trump, as he was one of the first bricks to fall from the wall that kept us from our goals, politically.

 

“The weakened state of what was at that time the United States of America presaged the merger between two of our early parent companies.”

 

“Yeah, Starbucks and Amazon,” Travis cut him off. “I saw the lobby display.”

 

John smiled indulgently.  _ For a person who smiles a lot,  _ Travis thought,  _ he sure has a way of making each one feel like a privilege. _

 

“That’s right,” John said. He had settled Buttercup in his lap and was stroking her ears as he spoke.

 

“Anyway, where was I? … Oh yes. I’ve discovered certain powers, Mister, uh--” he furrowed his brows, peering at Travis. “I just realized I never asked your name.”

 

“It’s Travis.”

 

“Just Travis?”

 

He didn’t answer.

 

“Alright, fine. Just Travis, then. Travis and Kravitz. Cute.

 

“Anyway, Travis, through years of research and study and practice, I’ve developed certain abilities. Things that have never been witnessed before in our reality.”

 

Travis must not have looked impressed enough. John leaned in. “Would you like to see?”

 

He held a hand in the air and snapped, and his hand was immediately engulfed in a black flame. He turned it from side to side, admiring it. Travis still stayed silent.

 

“Metaphysical ammunition,” John mused. He snapped again and the fire disappeared. “You see? But mere destruction was not enough. It was never enough. I don’t want to burn the world… I want to own it. I want to build it, bigger and better than anyone had ever imagined.”

 

“How can you build it  _ bigger _ ?” Travis asked. “That doesn’t make sense.”

 

“Ah, Travis,” John said, leaning back. “I’m so glad you asked.” He snapped his fingers again and the flame appeared, larger now.

 

“Where do you think this comes from, Travis?”

 

Travis shrugged. John  _ tsk _ ed.

 

“Law of conservation, Travis. Energy, like matter, cannot be created or destroyed-- however, it can be  _ borrowed _ .” He smiled, sharklike. “Ask me from where, Travis.”

 

Travis was silent.

 

John sighed and flicked his fingers toward Travis’ feet. The ball of black flame shot from them, engulfing his legs up to knee. The pain was searing, almost unbearable. He fought back a cry of pain, and failed, shuddering as the scream left him and John snapped again, putting the fire out.

 

“Now it’s very interesting,” John went on, as if he was lecturing a college class and not torturing a prisoner (though the two already felt more similar than not, in Travis’ experience), “you’ll note that the blackfyre does not consume the material as it burns. Unlike earthly fire no combustible is needed. Clean, quick, untraceable.” The shark smile had returned. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

 

John’s smile faded as he realized Travis was still not speaking. He tightened his grip on Buttercup. “Well? Don’t you have anything to say about that?”

 

Travis realized this was his cue to try and get in good with John, to try and strike a deal for his own safety as well as Buttercup’s. But he remembered Kravitz’s words.  _ Death would only bring me back to him,  _ Travis thought, and the idea gave him a warm sense of strength.  _ I would rather be back there than here. It doesn’t matter. _

 

Travis tried to square his shoulders, the motion stymied by his bound hands. He cocked his head at John. Instead of complimenting him, he said “Isn’t blackfyre a Game of Thrones thing? That’s the nerdiest shit I’ve ever heard! And I’ve heard a lot!” He forced a laugh. “Call me Khaleesi, I guess, since you pointed out I’m the Unburnt.”

 

John jumped to his feet, shoving Buttercup to the floor. She immediately ran to Travis and cowered behind his legs. “I’ve had just about enough of your insolence,” John spat. “You find yourself in audience of the most powerful man on Earth, on  _ any  _ Earth, and you pepper me with old and stupid jokes? How dare you!”

 

He had not snapped his fingers again, but Travis saw John’s outline shimmer with the same bright blackness of the flame. Sensing danger, he saw fit to change his tone. Quickly.

 

“Alright, fine!” he said, trying to assuage John. “You’re right. This is some shit I’ve never seen before. You said the fire was borrowed. You were talking about the world, making it-- bigger? I don’t know what your plans for me are but I  _ am  _ curious about your shit. Okay? So do you want to tell me about it or not?”

 

John sat again, appeased. The dark flicker of his outline still persisted but grew fainter as he spoke. “Oh, Travis,” he said softly. “I would like to tell you about it.

 

“I told you this--” he cut a finger through the air and it accumulated a trail of sparkling darkness as it moved-- “was borrowed. It is, in fact, borrowed from another  _ dimension _ .” John paused for appreciation but Travis only moved his shoulders in a half shrug.

 

“That doesn’t impress you?” John sounded genuinely puzzled.

 

“No, I mean, yeah, like, it’s  _ cool _ , but like-- I came here from the astral plane, like, earlier today. You know? So you’re not exactly blowing my mind.” He shrugged again.

 

“Fair enough. Well, in  _ our  _ plane, in  _ our  _ reality, no one besides my team and I has ever discovered how to borrow energy or matter from another dimension.” The sting in his tone was unmistakable.

 

“I started small, of course. I told you I had a pet cat as a boy-- one of my earliest experiments in creating and controlling life was in rebuilding him. I wanted to overcome the boundaries between life and death, you see-- you saw our history exhibit downstairs, you said? So you already know it’s a mission that drives me to this day.

 

“Unfortunately, being as he was one of my first creations, I’m afraid I became overambitious and poured too much of my own heart into the project. I gave the poor cat the powers I wished to have-- the ability to absorb the life force of lesser beings, for one, and the power to take a piece of one thing and manipulate it into a replica of the thing itself. In short, he possessed the untameable proficiency for striking bargains that I wished to embody myself.”

 

John crossed his legs, watching Travis’ reactions intently. Travis did his best to school his features into a mask of apathy.

 

“You mentioned Trump, before,” John went on. “Perhaps you are familiar with the way he haggled his way into politics by trading on his self-proclaimed ability to make deals. My cat, Garfield, was named for another president, but he had quite the ability to make deals himself.”

 

Travis choked on his laughter. A plan had been forming in his mind-- keep quiet, learn as much as he could, bide his time, wait for an opportunity to take Buttercup and run-- but  _ this?  _ This was almost too much.

 

“ _ Garfield _ ?” he spit out, feeling tears form at the corners of his eyes from the effort of holding in gales of laughter.

 

“That’s right,” John said. “I named him after President James Garfield. Did you know he died in office after only serving a few months? I remember learning the story in History class. Such a waste! American politics were ridiculously inefficient, outdated before they even began… of course, really, the truly antiquated issue here is death itself.” Another sharky smile.

 

“Did you know Garfield’s wife was named Lucretia?” he went on. 

 

“UH,” Travis said. 

 

“It means ‘profit,’” John mused. “From the Latin. An admirable aspiration, if I do say so myself.

 

“Anyway, Garfield-- the cat, I mean-- became too powerful, too strange. Too much of the otherworlds in him, I suppose. No cat should be able to talk, much less try to barter. 

 

“But he was my pet, you see. Not unlike your, um… your rat here.”

 

“She’s a  _ dog _ ,” Travis interrupted.  _ What kind of future is this that has forgotten what dogs are? _

 

“Sure,” John said. “Anyway, I couldn’t bring himself to kill him outright. So I flexed another new power my team had recently uncovered: the ability to open whole portals between dimensions and take or leave matter from it at will, rather than just energy.

 

“So I made a portal-- who knows to where!-- and I pushed the damn cat through. Out of sight, out of mind.” He smiled and snapped, the flame appearing in his hands again.

 

He pointed at Buttercup. “I’m sure you’ll agree,” he said levelly, “that things we try to care for will only weigh us down, in time.” He flicked his fingers.

 

Time seemed to slow. Travis watched, helpless, as a jet of dark flame shot across the room toward Buttercup. She barely had time to inch herself backward to seek protection behind Travis before the fire found her, moving over and through her in the blink of an eye. A whimper, a truncated howl, and Buttercup lay suddenly very still.

 

“What the  _ fuck! _ ” Travis heard himself screaming. “She’s my dog! What the fuck?! Buttercup!  _ Buttercup!  _ What the--”

 

“Enough.” John said. He stood. “You made a mistake bringing her here with you, Travis. She’s a liability. Kravitz made the same mistake when he brought you here.” He snapped and fire licked up Travis’ ankles and legs, stretching upward and searing over his hands and wrists. He howled as much from grief as pain.

 

“Taking you out of the equation made things  _ remarkably  _ easy with your friend Mr. Kravitz. Once he saw you go down, he was an absolute lamb in submitting to our requests.” John dropped to a squat in front of Travis, hands held loosely between his knees. He looked into Travis’ face and cocked a sly grin.

 

“Never thought the god of death would go for the chubby bearded type but I’ve been wrong before. It’s been years since I wasted any kind of time on relationships.”

 

“You’re wrong,” Travis croaked. His voice felt far away and painful, as though the ethereal fire had burned his throat as well. He couldn’t bear to look down at John, at Buttercup’s lifeless little body on the ground beside him. She looked so small and delicate in death. He bit back a sob.

 

“You’re wrong to think you can get anywhere alone. You’re going to need people. We  _ all  _ need people. And when Kravitz comes for your shitty broken soul you’ll be more pathetic and meaningless than anything you ever tried to kill.”

 

John sighed and stood, brushing invisible dirt from his slacks. “I never said I was alone, Travis,” he said. “I’ve got legions at my command. The whole world. More than that!”

 

A raw, empty coldness was gnawing at Travis’ gut. He allowed pieces to fall together that he’d been resisting since they had arrived. He knew this was his own world, although they had gotten the time wrong-- been off by decades, yet again. He saw John in front of him. He knew. He  _ knew. _

 

“John,” he said slowly. “You’re…”

 

“Remarkable?” John asked, cutting him off. He quirked a perfect eyebrow. “Charming? Impressive? All this and more, Travis. I’d love to stay and chat more-- frankly, I was going to kill you as soon as I got a sense of what your association is with Mr. Kravitz, but I’ve rather enjoyed the chance to talk freely-- but I’m afraid I must be going now. Big things are happening tonight, you see. Onward and upward.”

 

John snapped again, and the last conscious memory Travis had was of a hot, dazzling pain.

 

\--

 

Travis woke up suddenly, limbs stiff and tingling. He pulled himself up to a sitting position, groaning, as the feeling returned to his hands and feet. He rubbed his eyes and was shocked to realize he was not in the boardroom anymore, nor on the Eternal Shores as he might have expected, but instead seemed to be in a van.

 

The same van, he realized, as the one he had rented to drive from Cincinnati home to Huntington to film their Seeso show a few years back. He was in the middle passenger row, sprawled awkwardly across the seats. He seemed to be alone.

 

He looked down at himself, half-expecting to still be in his fancy dystopian suit, half-expecting the full Monty. He still had his socks and trousers on but was stripped down to a white t-shirt. His belt, button-down, blazer, and boots were in a neatly folded pile on the passenger seat. He brushed his hair back and reached for them.

 

“Oh, hi,” boomed a voice. Travis shrank back reflexively. He searched for a source of the sound but found nothing.

 

“Sorry!” the voice came again. This time it was about half as loud. “Didn’t mean to scare you. Uhh… welcome!”

 

“ _ Griffin _ ?” Travis asked, disbelieving.

 

There was a pause and a soft, disembodied laugh. “Uh, no, sorry. Your sweet baby brother is alive and well.” The voice, however, remained eerily similar to Griffin’s.

 

“So who the hell are  _ you _ ?” Travis asked. It came out more rudely than he’d intended. “Sorry, I just mean-- pretty much the only people I’ve talked two in the last couple of days have either informed me I’m dead or outright killed me, so forgive me for being touchy.”

 

“You good, my dude,” came the voice. Travis could now tell that it actually seemed to be emanating from the van’s soundsystem. He shook his head. He looked out the window for some clue of where he’d wound up but found only a pure white light that blazed in from all sides.

 

“Are you going to tell me where I am?” he asked the radio panel. He didn’t know where else to look.

 

“Uh, nope, can’t do that, sorry,” the voice replied. “Technically I am not even supposed to talk to a Creation. But you usually don’t wake up here, either, so, you know-- standard rules don’t apply.”

 

“Uh huh,” Travis said. “Wait, are you the one that took my clothes last time?” His own voice sounded fainter, smaller. 

 

“My b,” said the voice. It sounded thinner now too. Travis rubbed his eyes. The light seemed to pour in from the windows, blowing out his vision and washing everything away to gossamer. The faintest echo of the voice sounded again. “Standard protocol,” it said. “You understand.”

 

\--

 

Travis woke up again and opened his eyes to find the now familiar sight of the Eternal Shores, rainbow surf lapping the sand a few feet away. He sat up. He was pleased to find that the mysterious van-voice had left him the shirt and pants and socks, though the rest of the get-up was nowhere in sight.

 

He heard footsteps behind him and as he turned they intensified into the sound of someone running hard across the sand. He hardly had time to make out Kravitz’s form before he’d skidded into the sand beside Travis, hands on his shoulders, pulling Travis in for a rough hug.

 

“Oh, hey, okay, hi,” Travis said. He hesitated for a split second before returning the hug. Kravitz squeezed him once more, then let him go, holding Travis at arm’s length for a moment before smiling tightly and helping him to his feet.

 

“I’d ask if they hurt you,” Kravitz said, relief evident in his voice, “but obviously they must have. The important thing is that you’re here again.” He squeezed Travis’ arm.

 

“But what about you?” Travis asked. “That creep John kept me up in his boardroom for fucking  _ ever  _ just monologuing at me-- Johnologuing,” (Kravitz issued a dry, perfunctory chuckle) “--but he never said what was actually going on.”

 

Kravitz shook his head. “You were right when you said it was a bad scene, Travis. As near as I can tell they’d recently discovered planar travel. Apparently we’d walked into the preparation for some big announcement or launch or something. If I had to guess I would say they planned to send out their first interplanar crew.”

 

“Shit,” Travis said. “ _ Shit!  _ We have to try and stop them! I’m sorry, Kravitz, I tried talking to him, I  _ did _ , but he had me trapped--”

 

“Shh, shh, Travis, it’s fine,” Kravitz held up a hand. He looked distracted. “One thing, though. Where’s Buttercup?”

 

Travis hung his head. His heart felt like it was made of dirty, flaking rust. “She-- they killed her, Kravitz. John killed her in front of me.” He met Kravitz’s eyes. “My hands were bound. I couldn’t stop him.” He began to cry again. He struggled to speak around his tears. “Shouldn’t… shouldn’t she be here? She came with me the first time. Isn’t she here?”

 

He glanced at Kravitz again, who looked grief-stricken and pale. “Travis, I’m so sorry,” he gasped. “I haven’t seen her come through.”

 

A sob wracked Travis’ chest and he hiccupped with the force of it. “I can’t,” he started, and stopped, burying his face in his hands for a moment. “Shouldn’t she be here?” he repeated at last. “Where do the souls go, if they don’t wash up on the shore?”

 

“They join the waves,” Kravitz said. His voice was oddly resolute. “It may not be too late. Wait here.”

 

Travis lifted his face from his hands to see Kravitz stepping away from him, sliding off his shoes and shrugging out of his jacket. His long fingers worked deftly to unbutton his vest and shirt, and a moment later he was down to just his suit pants, striding toward the water, the black of the raven wing tattoos across his dark skin cutting a somber figure against the colorful tide.

 

Travis watched, awed, as Kravitz dove purposefully into the waves and struck out from shore.


	5. INTERLUDE I: In Thrall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kravitz lays it all out. The Raven Queen makes a ruling. Buttercup is thought of fondly. Travis goes a whole chapter without crying (because he's not in this one).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi pals! Thank you as always for reading, and for your comments and kudos! I love em. I love you. Enjoy!

_BEFORE_

 

Kravitz had barely gotten himself out in time. Something was seriously wrong with the offices of the Starbuck-Helles Corporation. Darkness seemed to be leaking in at the edges. There was a tang of burned energy in the air. He had been foolish not to heed it immediately and leave the way they’d come.

 

But he hadn’t, and he had suspected Travis of something sinister, and then Travis had been beaten and incapacitated and dragged away, and Kravitz threw down his scythe and submitted in an effort to protect him from further harm.

 

They’d _loved_ that.

 

Captain Ron, the head of John’s personal guard, had been the one to bind him and march him to John’s private offices. He’d left Kravitz under lock and key, smirking, saying John would be in to interrogate him soon. _Word has it he’s a bit of a sadist_ , Ron had said. _Maybe you just want to talk to me instead?_

 

Kravitz had remained resolutely silent. He would deal with John himself. He had ways of cutting someone’s time short and advancing their visit to the Eternal Stockade. He bristled with unspent energy.

 

Kravitz hadn’t been alone long when John reappeared. He said he’d just checked on Travis and the boy was still soundly unconscious thanks to the tranquilizer dart a guard had planted in his neck.

 

John bragged for a bit, and Kravitz only half-listened, eyes roaming over the office interior for some clue as to what he had walked into. Then John started going on about interplanar energy transfer and Kravitz was suddenly very attentive.

 

John had seen his interest pique and rewarded him with a practiced smile. _That’s right,_ he’d said. _And tonight we lift the veil. Or, rather, we burn the veil to dust and we push our way through._

 

 _Would you like a preview?_ He’d asked.

 

Kravitz had been consumed in a black fire that blazed and stung him to the core of his unfeeling spectral body. John’s fire was something more than fire; it didn’t feed off matter, but strength. Kravitz could feel his vitality being siphoned away. Worse, when he looked at John, he saw the outline of the man shimmering and growing stronger, as if a bond had been created between them that drained all energy into him. John was the bottom of a waterfall. He was a bonfire and the wood and the ashes all at once.

 

 _You see_ , John said. _I can be the beginning and the end. I have the power to take what I need, and to animate the husk of what’s left with my own will. You’re strong, Kravitz, I know you are. All my research tells me so. But I’m going to break you down._

 

John had spread his hands wide then. He was so impressed with himself.

 

_Welcome to your prison, Kravitz. I will keep you here and you will help me grow stronger, until you have nothing left to give. And when I’ve killed Death? Well, once I’ve done that… I imagine I’ll be unstoppable._

 

Kravitz shook with fury and with exhaustion. The fire had died away at John’s command but he felt empty in its wake. Still, he would not acknowledge John’s words. He would not reply.

 

 _You don’t have to talk_ , John said. _I’m going to go visit your friend Travis again. He’s weak, isn’t he? So much weaker than you._ John had crossed the room toward him without Kravitz even registering the movement. He traced a finger from Kravitz’s eye socket down the length of his cheekbone and jaw.

 

 _Death_ , he’d murmured. _Decay. The whole charade is so... gauche._

 

And John had left the room, leaving Kravitz alone and suffering.

 

Luckily, he’d seen a way out and seized it. He couldn’t blame John and his guards for their particular ignorances, really; they’d tried so hard to capture Death, and yet, they had not been hitherto successful. They couldn’t have known how easily he could shift himself between planes.

 

If so, they would never have locked him in a room with a perfectly round mirror.

 

In his weakened state Kravitz wouldn’t be able to get himself home, not reliably, but he could still manage _something._ He struggled and finally slipped his bonds and pitched himself through the glass. He landed hard on a stone floor, falling to his knees, only barely catching himself before toppling over entirely. He hurt everywhere in a dull, metaphysical pain; he didn’t suffer wounds anymore, not as such, but was conscious of the strength he lost in any fight.

 

John had taken so much of his strength.

 

He glanced up and watched the circular rift swirl shut lazily. _Good._ No one could follow him now. Hopefully John would not realize the trick.

 

Kraviz cursed himself now for his foolishness in thinking Travis had been involved. The scruffy otherworlder was too goofy, too good, to have been involved in any kind of trans-dimensional murder plot.

 

He _had_ said it was his own world that Kravitz had brought him to, said he recognized some kind of landmark, but he had been right-- the time was too far off. In the moment, however, Kravitz had let his anger get the better of him.

 

Kravitz hung his head. He had known for too long that prayer was an empty gesture, and he didn’t know who he had ought to pray to if he did at all, but nonetheless he squeezed his eyes shut and hoped with his whole heart that Travis had not been further harmed by the man John or any of his guards.

 

He drew in a steadying and wholly unnecessary breath and opened his eyes, rocking back on his heels to survey the scenery.

 

He’d been here more times than he could count. It wasn’t exactly a surprise that this is where he’d ended up after escaping the ambitious men of Earth. That didn’t make it any less unpleasant, though.

 

He stood, straightened himself, and shook off any trace of his mortal glamor to ease fully into the skeletal form that had become familiar over the past countless decades. Although it stripped him to bones and shadows he still felt oddly more comfortable appearing before her in this form; so much of his true self was hidden. _Is this what work-life balance is?_ he mused.

 

He struck off down one of the tall corridors. Every Kenku guard dipped their head in deference as he passed, though he could feel their yellow eyes on his back as he made his way through the interminably tall pillars that marked the path to the throne room.

 

The halls were made of the same black obsidian as the Eternal Stockade, but where the walls of his own domain seemed to glow with a burnished light from familiarity and care, the black glass here felt empty and cold. He fought back a shiver. He would not allow himself to be seen approaching the throne as anything less than her equal.

 

Finally he came to the end of the hallway, where two of the largest Kenku guards stood with their spears crossing the massive double doors. Kravitz touched his forehead in deference, lowering his eyes and bowing his head a fraction of an inch.

 

“I’m here to see the Queen,” he said.

 

\--

 

The Raven Queen was magnificent as she ever was, arrayed in purple silks and blue brocade, the train of her robes trailing over the edge of the tall dais. Her throne was massive, made of jet and carved with a dozen tableaus of death, disease, and dismemberment, but the darkness of it only threw her moon-white skin into clearer relief.

 

She was dazzling. As always.

 

Immediately upon Kravitz’s entry, she clapped her hands. Her chamber guards snapped to attention, the rippling silver silk of their uniforms shimmering with the sudden movement.

 

“Leave us,” she breathed.

 

Her voice was all coal and peat smoke, the sweet stench of decay, the silver sea after a storm. The guards hesitated only slightly before departing. The last of them eyed Kravitz in unkind appraisal. Apparently he passed, though, as a moment later the doors fell shut behind him with a heavy slam and he found himself alone with his queen.

 

“Morrigan,” he said, as formally as he could. He never seemed to recover his natural cadence in her company. Every word sounded archaic and overy courteous. He dropped to one knee and bowed his head.

 

“Oh, don’t, pet!” she laughed. He tried to keep his face neutral as he met her eyes and stood.

 

“It’s been too long,” she purred. “Come closer.”

 

He stepped forward and into the circle of light cast by a magicked lantern at her feet.

 

“Too thin,” she clucked. “And how is it your hair is still going grey? You’ve been dead for centuries.”

 

“As you say, my queen.”

 

“So formal! Don’t you have any compliments for me?” She shifted coyly on her throne and a pale, voluptuous leg appeared from her skirts. She batted her eyes. Kravitz did not break her gaze.

 

“You are a vision as always, Morrigan. I do not know how you look younger every time I behold you.”

 

And it was true-- her black hair was forever growing longer and thicker, and today it cascaded slick and sinuous over her shoulders and the arms of her throne. The iron and diamond circlet she wore glittered like cold stars against a midnight sky. Her plum-painted lips parted in anticipation. Her skin was perfectly smooth and plump, her figure alluring, her eyes unerringly bright.

 

She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, and he felt nothing for her.

 

She laughed throatily at his flattery and raised a dainty hand to her collar. “You are charming as always, Kravitz. But I imagine you did not come here merely for a social call.” She pouted. “You visit so infrequently these days.”

 

He bowed from the waist. “As you say, Morrigan. I am sorry to have been absent. I find myself here today as the result of unexpected and unfortunate events.”

 

She quirked a perfect eyebrow. “Do go on.”

 

\--

 

Kravitz described carefully having found Travis whole and conscious on the Eternal Shores, his loyal dog improbably still following, and how they had endeavoured to find why Travis’ entry in the Tome was so disjointed.

 

He pushed down the anxiety that nagged at him and recounted, apologetic, how he had assumed an error in the Tome entry, which he had tried to correct by bringing Travis back to his own time and place. He did not mention their first unfortunate foray into America’s early war, nor his consultation with Barry that lead him to consider finding the nearest fixed point. He tried to avoid disparaging the Tome itself and the organization of the entries-- it was, after all, Morrigan’s own handiwork.

 

Kravtiz told her of the world where they found themselves, the vainglorious attempt of the Earth man John to overcome death itself, and he related what John had told him after they struck Travis, and drugged him, and dragged his body away, and Kravitz had surrendered.

 

He did not tell her how he felt his empty heart break at the sight of Travis’ unconscious, innocent body disappearing through an elevator door as he was carried off. He did not tell her how he had pleaded with them for Travis’ safety. He knew logically it wasn’t pertinent to the matter at hand but, more than that, he was embarrassed at his own conduct. He was Death. It was not in his purview to argue for the living to maintain their status as such.

 

But then, Travis was not truly living. Kravitz’s gut said so, and his heart, but he could not quite bring his conscious mind to entertain the thought. He knew, even without Morrigan’s final judgment, that Travis was on borrowed time.

 

He finished the telling of his recent journeys, and bowed his head. The silence seemed to stretch forever.

 

“Kravitz,” Morrigan said at last. Her playful tone was gone. She sounded thoughtful. He raised his head and met her piercing gaze. “Tell me one thing. Why did you not bring him to me immediately?”

 

Kravitz hesitated. He was glad that his face lacked skin, and veins, and muscles, so she would not see him cringe and blush.

 

“You were afraid,” She said softly. “Kravitz, look at me. You were afraid that I would-- what? Devour him?” She smiled at him, softly, and although there was no malice in it there was no mistaking the pointed gleam of her razor-sharp teeth.

 

“You know I am not hasty, pet,” she murmured. “I would no sooner devour a soul without trial than I would ignore the boundaries of our... _professional_ relationship. Without your participation, I mean.” Her eyes fairly glowed through lowered lashes. They were the same stormy violet as his own but his feelings reflected nothing of what he saw in hers.

 

“I was not afraid you would devour him,” Kravitz said. He sounded more defensive than he would have liked. He searched for an answer. “I-- I suppose I felt-- protective of him, in a sense. He seemed lost. He didn’t seem… forgive me, my queen, as I do not mean to question your divine judgment, but I must say he didn’t seem as though he had ought to be dead. Not yet.”

 

“You said the same of  the Bluejeans boy,” she said. Her voice was still low but it held now a note of stone.

 

“I did,” Kravitz acknowledged. No use being coy now. “I felt then, as I confess I do now, that there was some larger force in motion which still needed to be played out. I feel as confident today as I did when I testified on behalf of Barry that he will contribute great and necessary things to his world--”

 

“Even as he ages and withers and has yet to produce any body of work,” Morrigan sneered. Their battle over Barry’s reinstallation in the world of the living had been the darkest mark yet between them in their hundreds of years working together.

 

Kravitz ignored her. “--and I feel equally confident that this Travis McElroy has something to give, as well, though I do not yet know what it is.”

 

“So what do you propose?” Her voice was hard but not unyielding.

 

“Well,” he paused. “Assuming he is safe in his own dimension now, I would request a detail-- one that I would personally oversee-- to encourage him to resist against this corporation that aims to defeat their own mortality. I would like permission to travel periodically to his world to lend wisdom and aid when possible.”

 

“And if they’ve already sent him back to the Astral Plane?”

 

Kravitz felt a sudden stillness behind his ribs. He had not dared consider the possibility. He squared his shoulders.

 

“Then I would request permission, and your assistance, to deliver him home to the correct time and place so that he may resume his life as it was left at the time of his passing, and to leave him with instructions on mitigating the future threat posed by the earth corporation I fought against today.”

 

“No,” she said.

 

“I beg your pardon?”

 

Her eyes flashed velvet thunder as she stared him down. “I said _no_ , Kravitz.”

 

He felt weak. He wished he could sit down. He wished he could be alone as he took in her ruling.

 

“You will not restore him to his own world,” she went on. “And if he is still in the wrong time then you must retrieve him through whatever means necessary.” She waved a distracted hand. “I’m sure the usual will do.

 

“You will retrieve him, and you will keep him in your custody at all times. As you leave on your task of collecting him, I shall set to a task of my own, and will pay a call to Istus to warn her of your coming. You will bring him to her temple at dawn. He must ask her to find his thread. If she finds it, and agrees with you that he has some role larger than that of the average mortal, then he may live. If not, he will be imprisoned in the Eternal Stockade until such time as his soul is unburdened enough to join the waters of the dead. Do you understand?”

 

Kravitz nodded, shaking.

 

“But--” he said. Morrigan made an impatient noise but he pushed on. “But, my queen, if Istus finds his thread and says he may live, where do I bring him? You say I am not to restore him to his own world?”

 

“Yes,” She said. “ _If_ she finds his thread, and _if_ she finds him worthy of pursuing further time among the living, you will bring him to your Bluejeans and leave him. Let the two of them work out their worthiness together. You will not have further contact with either of them.”

 

“Yes, my queen,” he said softly. A dark emptiness roared through the hollow of his bones.

 

“Now go,” she sighed. “You’re a pretty face, Kravitz, but I tire of your sentimentality. I always seem to forget how very soft you are.”

 

“Yes, my  queen,” he repeated, and turned on his heel to sweep out of the room.

 

\--

 

Kravitz stalked his way back through the echoing halls of Morrigan’s temple, the Kenku pulling back nervously as he approached. He flickered between his flesh and skeletal forms, finding comfort in the structured cocoon of one then abruptly needing the immaterial freedom of the other, but regardless he felt himself sparking with the frenetic energy that his frustration seemed to always produce.

 

His mind whirled and circled over the ruling of the Raven Queen, wondering how he could bend the rules just enough to keep Travis safe without incurring her wrath. He could not stand the idea of leaving Travis alone in that world which had greeted them with violence and pride, and so he must obey at least some part of the queen’s command. But what if Istus should find him lacking? He knew she was gentle where Morrigan was hard, and understanding where Morrigan was vicious, and Kravitz could only hope that she might find some mercy for whatever Travis’ next journey might have to be.

 

 _But hasn’t the boy already been through enough_ ? Kravitz thought, _leaving his family and going through death and different dimensions just to try and make things right?_

 

Kravitz slammed his fist into his palm and a shower of violet sparks exploded from his hands as they met. The nearest guard let out a frightened squawk and abandoned their post as they hurried away. Kravitz took advantage of the opportunity to be briefly unobserved and he paused, the anger draining from him suddenly. The ache of his encounter with John still tugged at him, though he tried to resist it.

 

He sighed, even though he didn’t need the breath and it was just a force of old habit,  and he wondered-- not for the first time-- if he had ought to set his own feelings aside and join the Raven Queen in the way in which he knew she wanted. He was perfectly happy being her bounty hunter, representing her as the mortal aspect of her dominion over the order of death, but he knew that what she _truly_ wanted was to crown him her king and take him to rule by her side.

 

 _It would certainly be easier to plead my case_ , he thought, _but then, how many stray souls would I be able to intercept, if I give up my place as the keeper of the Stockade and sole agent of the astral realm?_

 

_How much of myself would I lose if I gave in to her?_

 

Kravitz settled finally into his flesh-and-blood self and spread his hands out in front of him, staring idly at the uncanny life-likeness of them. The Raven Queen was vain and so she had taken him in his prime, still strong and lean, washing away the potential for him to grow any greater or to diminish with age.

 

Every day his work saw him moving through time, forward and backward, but apart from the silver thag still streaked his hair it never took its toll on his body. The only mark of change in the past centuries since he had been brought over to her cause was the network of feather tattoos that began at his fingertips and ran up his arms and across his shoulders and back. A symbol of his servitude.

 

How many nightmares had he endured, when he still attempted sleep, that saw his hands disintegrate beneath the feathers until all that was left of him were the massive inarticulate wings of a carrion bird? How many nights did he close his eyes only to relive the experience of the ink being scarred into his skin?

 

She had done it herself, Morrigan had, though Kravitz didn’t know her deeply enough yet to know her as such. She was just the Raven Queen to him then. Beautiful. Formidable. When she carved the first design into his skin, he did not flinch; it was only after, when she stroked his face and offered to take his pain away, that he had been unable to suppress a shudder.

 

Kravitz had seen the shock and hurt in her eyes as she withdrew-- it was not every day, after all, that she was rejected by a man. In fact, he would be willing to bet that he had been the first.

 

He knew it only made her want him more.

 

He clenched his hands into fists and dropped them to his side. _I have to find a way to fight for Travis. For a way to keep him safe, somehow_ . _And for Buttercup_. He smiled at the memory of the little dog. It had been so long since he had felt this-- this warmth.

 

_I’m going to save them. I have to. For their sake as much as mine._


	6. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Buttercup is lovingly recalled. Travis puts it all together. Kravitz moves them forward. A few creature comforts are enjoyed by the dead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all! Thank you as always for your responses and support <3 this was originally a much more plot-heavy chapter BUT it feels like our boys are due for some warm fuzzies before they have to go on navigating the dark waters of death and undeath, doesn't it? Anyway, please enjoy this warm hug of a chapter and do something nice for yourself today!

Kravitz waded a few steps into the waves and dove in, falling into a strong breaststroke. Travis watched anxiously from shore.

 

_ How does he know where he’s going? _ He thought.  _ If the waves are all joined souls how would he ever find Buttercup among them? _

 

Kravitz’s head appeared above water a few hundred feet away. He scanned the horizon and changed direction. Travis hurried to follow the movement on foot.

 

“Come on, Buttercup,” he whispered. He chipped at the little bit of nail polish he still had left. “Come on, come on.”

 

And then Kravitz dove under purposefully and a moment later re-emerged, arms first, holding something small and translucent aloft. His head broke water next and he coughed a spray of rainbow foam. He tucked the small shining thing to his chest and launched himself into a one-arm crawl. A moment later he washed up at Travis’ feet.

 

“Here,” he said, pushing the little bundle of light and wet at Travis. Travis hesitated, then reached out, taking the shimmering thing in both hands. 

 

“Buttercup?” he asked tentatively. The light shifted and grew brighter. He could swear he felt it become warmer in his hands.

 

“It’s her,” Kravitz said encouragingly. “Talk to her. She’ll remember you.”

 

“Hi, Buttercup,” Travis said. He felt foolish but the ache in his heart pushed him forward. He needed  _ something _ . He needed a friend. He needed her. “Hey, Butt. It’s me. It’s me, your dad!” He cuddled her to his chest like he had when she was a puppy. The airy form of her-- it was her, he could tell now, he could feel that it was-- wriggled against him. 

 

“Remember that time you ate my favorite boots?” he whispered to her. Another wriggle. Her weight was beginning to register. She was  _ definitely _ getting warmer. “Remember when me and Teresa picked you out from the shelter? Remember how you came home with us that day and you whined whenever we stopped petting you, and how that first night she cuddled you all night long?” Buttercup’s tongue shot out and licked his cheek, light as a fairy wing. He laughed. “Remember how you howled when we brought home Bebe? But we didn’t replace you, did we, it was just the baby. Your friend. Bebe. That was our family, Buttercup! It’s me, Butt, it’s me, it’s me.”

 

He was talking into her fur now, her warm and wonderfully familiar fur, and under the salty smell of the water still clinging to her was her familiar doggy smell, her terrible doggy breath. She whined a little, a joyful puppy noise, and he was over the moon to realize she was her usual heavy ungainly self again in his arms.

 

She licked his face all over and he planted kiss after grateful kiss onto her face and ears until she strained to get free. He set her down on the sand. She shook herself off and then trotted a circle around Kravitz, barking happily, backing her rear up to him so he could scratch above her tail.

 

“Aw!” Travis said. “She’s saying thank you!”

 

Kravitz was leaning over, petting her sides with both hands, and her tongue lolled out as she stared up at him with unfettered adoration. He glanced up and met Travis’ eyes. His grin was wide and true.

 

“Seriously, though,” Travis said. “Thank you. Like, just-- thank you so much. She’s everything.”

 

“She is,” Kravitz agreed. “I’m glad we found her.”

 

“ _ You  _ found her!” Travis said. “Nice work! How did you even know where she might be?”

 

Kravitz shrugged. Multicolor droplets shimmered in his locs and on his shoulders, running in rivulets down his arms and catching the light from the setting sun. “New souls start close to shore,” he said. “There’s a sandbar a little ways out where it gets shallower and it stays warm from the sunlight. Pets tend to congregate there before they go looking for their owners.”

 

Travis’ heart swelled. “They do that?”

 

“Oh, absolutely,” Kravitz said. “In time, their souls will sort of-- become dissolute, I guess? Dissolve?-- and they drift until they find a trace of their person, or their people. It’s like… Like stirring sugar into tea.”

 

Travis couldn’t help but think of high school chemistry experiments. “So the whole ocean is a solution?” he asked. “Like, a soul-ution?” 

 

Kravitz grinned again. “I guess so, yeah.” Travis made a face. “How’s it feel to swim in that?”

 

“Not great, I have to say!” They both laughed. “But I go in now and again to sort of monitor things, make sure there’s no issue in the way the souls are distributing amongst each other.”

 

“Make sure no one’s making waves?”

 

Kravitz  groaned and began to walk away.

 

“Gotta make sure no one rocks the boat, right?” Travis persisted, following. Buttercup trotted between them, tail held aloft and wagging triumphantly.

 

“Travis!”

 

“Gotta keep up on current events!”

 

“ _ Travis. _ ”

 

Travis couldn’t see Kravitz’s face but the laughter in his voice was plain. Travis smiled and picked up his pace. It was good to be back.

 

\--

 

The blue enamel tea kettle had been called upon again for its service and it whistled merrily now as Kravitz dried himself by the woodstove and Travis toweled off Buttercup. She shook herself again, spraying salty soul-water across the room.

 

Travis laughed and wrapped her in the towel once more. “It’s so weird,” he said. “I mean, I’m dead, I guess, so that’s an adjustment. But of all the little material things I miss I think Buttercup’s tags are right up there.”

 

“Her tags?” Kravitz asked, curiously.

 

“Yeah!” Travis said. “Like, her dog tags. Oh, um-- we put a collar on her, you know, and then we hang little tags from the collar in case she runs away or something, and the tags say where we live so someone can bring her home.”

 

“And you miss-- seeing them?”

 

“Well, no, not really that. It’s just that they make a cute little jingling noise when she runs around or shakes off. So say I’m used to seeing her, like, shake herself off after swimming. Right? I’m used to hearing her tags jangle as part of that.”

 

“I see.” Kravitz stroked his chin and Travis laughed at the gesture.

 

“What is it? What are you thinking?”

 

“Wait here.”

 

Kravitz returned a moment later and plopped gracelessly onto the couch beside Travis. He held his hand out, opening his fingers to show Travis a small blue disc in his palm. 

 

“What’s that?” Travis asked. He took the disc and held it up to the light, peering through it.

 

“It’s a mirror,” Kravitz said. “It doesn’t look like anything now, but it would help me find her if she ever... gets lost.” The unsaid hung in the air between them. “Besides,” he went on, “if you’re ever in another plane without me and you need my help, or you want to… talk, I suppose, or… if you… want to check in…”

 

He was trailing off. Travis nudged him. “Yeah?”

 

“Sorry,” Kravitz said, and flashed a quick smile. The tips of his ears shaded in a dusky flush. “If you ever want to-- check in, you’ll be able to do so with this mirror.”

 

“Oh!” Travis said. “OH!” He smacked his forehead. “ _ Duh _ . I should have known about this, I’m sorry.”

 

“Um…  _ Should _ you have?”

 

“Yeah!” Travis knocked Kravitz’s shoulder with his own. “I  _ told  _ you, we wrote this shit! Well, Griffin did. But I played through it.”

 

“Amazing,” Kravitz murmured. He leaned slightly into Travis, the chilliness of his skin leaching through Travis’ thin t-shirt. Still, Travis didn’t pull away.

 

“But, yeah, so,” Travis coughed. “Um, the planes-- the planar mirrors. I know about that. I forget which is supposed to be which, but yours must be sapphire, right?”

 

“That’s right.”

 

“But we can’t drill a hole in it, or anything,” Travis mused. “And Buttercup doesn’t have a collar anyway. How are we going to get it on her?”

 

“You forget! I  _  do  _ have dominion over all matter in this plane.” Kravitz beamed. “Show off,” Travis muttered. Kravitz, already setting to his work, ignored him.

 

Travis watched in fascination as Kravitz seemed to pull a slender length of fine-spun rope from thin air, pulling, twisting, knotting, until an inch-wide band of flat webbing emerged and grew longer with his efforts. He flicked his wrist to produce a silver ring and incorporated it into the design, then motioned to Travis to bring Buttercup closer and he joined the ends around her neck. With a wave of his hand the threads fused together and the collar glowed faintly for a moment, then dimmed. It was done. Buttercup wagged her tail. 

 

“How did y--”

 

“Let me finish,” Kravitz said. He gently plucked the mirror out of Travis’ fingers and placed it in midair. He traced his forefinger around its edge, a hair’s breadth away from actually touching it, and a fine silver metal followed his motion to flow over the edges of the gem. He traced its circumference and then, with a flourish, added a loop at the top of the silvery frame. He patted his leg and Buttercup eagerly transferred herself from Travis’ lap to his. He pushed the sapphire mirror-tag through the air to her and, with a final flick of his wrist, joined it to the ring at the front of her new collar.

 

“There!” he said, still beaming. “How’s that?”

 

“I love it!” Travis said. “Plus, you know, there’s some real ‘Orion’s Belt’ shit here. You know,  _ the universe is in Orion’s Belt _ , that whole Men in Black thing?”

 

“Oh,” Kravitz said. “Sure.” He looked slightly put out that Travis has so quickly transitioned from praise to pop culture reference.

 

“But I  _ love  _ it,” Travis rushed to say. “It looks so good on her! Besides... now I can always call. Call you.”

 

Kravitz met his eyes and smiled.

 

\--

 

Night had fallen since their return and although Travis was comforted somewhat by the now-familiar apartment, he couldn’t shake the unease that his most recent death had left him with. He was nearly certain that the John he had met in the near future of his own timeline was the same John that Griffin had written, the John who would go on to become the Hunger, the big bad of their first story.

 

_ But how could that be possible? _

 

Travis knew he was prone to flights of fancy, and he had never had trouble suspending his disbelief when reading books or watching movies or directing theatre or playing D&D, but with all of reality now seemingly changed around him he distrusted his own brain.  _ Did I really die and wake up here? What if it’s all just been a fever dream?  _

 

_ Is any of this real? _

 

He shifted uncomfortably but Kravitz did not take notice.

 

“So,” Travis said. “We should probably talk about what happened.”

They were sitting at Kravitz’s table, an earthenware pot of steaming stew in the center of it, a loaf of simple bread that Travis had baked himself sitting cut but uneaten. Kravitz, despite having a surprisingly well-stocked pantry, didn’t seem to need to eat-- or, at any rate, wouldn’t eat in front of him. He’d been growing quieter and more withdrawn all evening. Meanwhile Travis’ stomach had been twisted into knots by the pieces of his thoughts that he kept trying to fit together in his mind and he could not even entertain the idea of putting anything in it. 

 

Still, cooking had seemed like the right thing to do. Cooking, or eating, had always been a comfortable diversion from whatever unpleasant thing was happening. And so he had asked Kravitz where he kept the flour and he made dough and he kneaded it-- probably more than it needed to be kneaded, strictly speaking, as the loaf had come out dense and heavy-- and when that wasn’t enough to set his thoughts straight, he asked for a few more essentials and started to pull together a hearty stew. At least it  _ smelled  _ good. He could be grateful for that.

 

Kravitz still wasn’t speaking so Travis cleared his throat. Buttercup lifted her head from her paws where she lay by the fire and cocked her head at him, but Kravitz barely stirred.

 

“Okay, so I’ll talk. I think something is bothering you too but I don’t know what so I’m just going to go ahead. Okay?” Travis took a deep breath and blew it back out. “Uh… aw, shit. This is so weird. This whole  _ thing  _ is so weird. Okay. So. I’m dead. And I’m here. And here is, uh.. Well, it’s the astral plane, right, and somehow I knew of its existence and sort of, like, interacted with it before I ever got here. Before I ever even knew it was real. And  _ you’re  _ real--” he gestured broadly at Kravitz and was pleased to see he at least now had the Reaper’s attention. “-- and  _ that  _ was a huge fucking shock, let me tell you. No offense. But then you try to take me back--”

 

“Travis,” Kravitz said softly, cutting him off. “Stop. You don’t have to recount everything. I was here too.”

 

“No, I know!” Travis responded. “This is probably annoying, and I’m sorry, but you’re just going to have to bear with me because right now I can’t keep it all in my head. This is all  _ happening _ , it has happened or will happen or whatever, and it’s kind of fucking me up! I mean, I think I’ve spent more time trying to get over the fact that this is real than I’ve spent coming to terms with the fact that I’m  _ dead _ .” He felt a hot softness in his eyes that usually signalled the arrival of tears but the feeling only made him angrier. “Damnit! I’m dead, and I can’t even deal with it-- and, again, to be clear, not your fault at all, I know-- but I can’t even deal with it because apparently my, like, soul is not done here. Or whatever!” He threw his hands up and slumped in his chair.

 

“I wish I could give you more time,” Kravitz said. His voice was still low.

 

“I don’t know if I need more time,” Travis grumbled. “At least not here. I would have liked to have had more time with my wife and daughter but apparently that’s off the table.”

 

There was a  _ clunk _ and Travis looked up to see Kravitz setting his mug of tea back upright. A puddle of tepid liquid was spreading over the table. “Don’t worry about it, I’ve got it,” Kravitz snapped, standing. He whipped a tea towel down from the counter and hastily mopped up the spill.

 

“Are you okay?” Travis asked.

 

“Of course I’m okay,” Kravitz huffed. He didn’t look up from the table.

 

“You didn’t know I had a family? Is that it?” Travis asked. “Jesus. What a rotten dad I am. What a shitty husband. I can’t believe I didn’t tell you that, like, immediately. Well, no, I guess I can believe it. It kind of…” he trailed off, pressing a fist to his solar plexus. He closed his eyes. “It hurts me, like actually physically hurts me, to think about them.”

 

Kravitz’s staccato mopping ceased. Travis opened his eyes to find Kravitz watching him, the same gentle expression in his violet eyes that Travis had seen when he first arrived. “I’m sorry, Travis,” he said. “I knew you left behind a family. You mentioned your brothers, and your mother who preceded you here, but I didn’t know…”

 

“It’s okay,” Travis said. He was trying very hard to remember that he had initiated the conversation because he needed to tell Kravitz about  _ John _ , about the Hunger, not the two beautiful girls he’d left behind. He tried to focus on something positive. Or at least something constructive.

 

“Look, you said that you and Barry think I’m still here because of some unfinished business. Well… I think I know what it is. Well, kind of. The thing is, John? You know… psycho in a suit? I think I know him.” Kravitz was watching him intently. He swallowed and went on.

 

“I am still trying to wrap my head around it, frankly, and I don’t know how crazy this sounds, so I am going to try and stick to like-- CliffsNotes. Keeping the long story short, okay?

 

“So, I told you, I know who you are and what this place is because of a story that my brother Griffin made up as a game for me and our brother Justin and my dad to play. And so we made characters and we got into fights and learned things about this world, about these planes, and then in the end we fought a big villain and we won and it was awesome. And that’s all fine and good and then we moved on with our lives.

 

“But then I died, and I came here, and I know this place and I know you. And I know some other things too, I think, if I can remember them all. And when we met John… well, it took me a while, but when we met John I realized I know him too.”

 

He stopped to catch his breath. He could feel his pulse racing. He wasn’t entirely sure why but he did appreciate the reminder that his body was still working, his blood still moving through his veins. What a confusing thing it was to be dead and still be conscious. He shook his head a little to clear the thought.

 

“Go on,” Kravitz said. Travis realized now that he was watching him closely, curious and intense, leaning forward as Travis spoke.

 

“Ah,” Travis said, “yeah, okay. So… John. He’s a kind of-- well, public speaker is what we said, but after seeing the whole Starbuck-Helles thing it seems like he’s more of a public figurehead for a massive company. And in our game, he found a way to--” he paused, searching for words. “He found a way to get to other worlds, other planes, and once he defeated them he could absorb their energy, their power. 

 

“But not just him. His whole dimension.  _ My  _ dimension. They had joined into one single force that could grow together and fight together and in our game they bled over into every dimension, every creation.

 

“We called them the Hunger.”

 

“The Hunger?” Kravitz said. He leaned back in his chair. “So how does he fit in with you, exactly? What do you think your unfinished business is?”

 

Travis knuckled his eye, sighing. “I wish I knew. I seriously wish I did. I thought for a second back there that it was to stop him right then, to try and get my shot in before he could go on to become what I realized he would be, but I was too slow. The time wasn’t right. And then…” he shrugged. “Then he killed me. And I--”

 

His head snapped up. “Shit! I can’t believe I forgot. I only just now remembered that I woke up once between there and here!”

 

Kravitz stared at him, brows shooting towards his hairline. “You  _ what?  _ You woke up?”

 

“Yeah! In like, a van! And there was a voice, and it was all white.”

 

Kravitz was shaking his head. “Oh, no, oh no, Travis. You’re not supposed to wake up in the place between places. No one is! Something  _ must  _ be wrong with you.”

 

“Hey!” Travis protested.

 

Kravitz stood, pacing. “It’s nothing personal,” he said. He clapped a hand on Travis’ back as he passed him. “ _ Obviously.  _ But I’ve never heard of anyone waking up in the place between places. We have a very delicate relationship with them. There are clear rules and boundaries.”

 

“Yeah,” Travis said. “The voice said something about standard protocol.”

 

“This is… this is not great, Travis, I have to tell you.” Kravitz stopped and turned to face him, sighing. “There’s something I should tell you, too. While you were still missing, I-- I found myself in the celestial plane before my patron, the Raven Queen.”

 

“Oh yeah,” Travis said. “Her.”

 

“Yes,  _ her _ .” Kravitz sniffed. “I tried to return here when I escaped from your earth and the man John but I was too weak and I made my way to her temple instead. I spoke with her and tried to ask for her help in returning you to the appropriate timeline, and in defeating John and his empire before he became a threat. I’m sorry to say that she refused.”

 

Travis’ heart fell. He hadn’t even realized the hope growing in him until it was squashed by Kravitz’s news.

 

“More than that, though,” Kravitz continued somberly, “She instructed me to take you for a consultation with the Lady Fate--”

 

“Istus!” Travis cut in. “Right?”

 

“Uh… yes. She instructed me to bring you to Istus, and-- and to let Istus help us form a plan from there.”

 

He looked as if he wanted to say more, but Travis decided not to push. Instead, he said, “Wow. Istus, huh? I bet that’s  _ going to be amazing _ .” He raised his eyes at Kravitz and bit his lip, half-expecting some kind of recognition, but none came. Kravitz seemed to be occupied with staring at the floor in abject melancholy.

 

_ Oh, fine _ , Travis thought.  _ I’ll just carry every reference from this bizarro fantasy dimension all by myself, I guess. Or maybe the jokes just haven’t been made yet. He doesn’t know Taako yet, after all. Wait-- maybe--?  _ A thought struck him.

 

“Hey Krav,” he said, “question for ya.”

 

Kravitz looked at him incredulously. “ _ Krav? _ ” he repeated.

 

“Oh what, I haven’t called you that before? Anyway, question. About Barry. How old is he?”

 

“How old-- how old is Barry Bluejeans?” Kravitz looked perplexed. “I suppose he’s about, oh, twenty-eight now? Twenty-nine? I always forget if he goes by his original birthday or his rebirth day. Why?”

 

“Oh wow,” Travis said. “Yeah, okay. Wow.” His head was buzzing with fragmented timelines. If the details of the D&D campaign were right, then Barry would be nearly fifty years old by the time the Hunger breached the prime material plane. He searched his memory, hoping desperately he could keep it all straight. If Barry was fifty then and Lucretia had been holding the Hunger at bay for ten years, maybe eleven, and Barry in this timeline-- assuming it could be counted on to be more or less linear-- was only twenty-eight, then there were still ten years unaccounted for. His head spun with the possibilities.

 

“Kravitz,” he said, “You said Barry is devoted to his research. What is he studying? Where does he work?”

 

“He works for the-- the Academy of Planar Research. His studies are mostly to do with biology--”

 

“Academy?” Travis asked. He was aware he was shouting and tried, unsuccessfully, to modulate his voice. He was finally on the edge of something. Something  _ huge _ . “Not Institute? Academy?”

 

“Yes, that’s right,” Kravitz replied. If he was shaken by Travis’ burst of intensity he didn’t show it.

 

“I get it now,” Travis whispered. “I think I get it.” He closed his eyes and swallowed, steeling himself.

 

“Hey, Kravitz?” he said. “I think it’s time we go see Istus.”

 

\--

 

Travis tried to sleep that night, but only because Kravitz insisted. Travis had argued they should go see Istus immediately, Kravitz argued back that they weren’t expected at her temple until dawn and it would be rude to arrive any earlier, and on and on the evening wore until it saw the two of them dozing at opposite ends of Kravitz’s chintz sofa, one enormous dusty quilt spread between them and weighted down by a gently snoring ball of Buttercup.

 

Still, Travis could barely keep his eyes closed. His blood was blazing with the possibility of understanding what all of this had been for. He forced himself to think beyond what answers the dawn would bring, to examine instead what that information would mean for him.

 

If there was no such thing yet as the Institute for Planar Research and Exploration, then there were no red robes. But if John was already in motion in his timeline, then the prime material plane and everyone on it would still be in danger, but would have no one to protect them. No one to  _ stop  _ them.

 

_ Is it me?  _ He thought.  _ Am I the one that brings the story to life? _

 

He tried to puzzle out the timelines, remembering the uncanny glow of the near-future Los Angeles he and Kravitz had visited. How could that be the primary timeline for his own earth if he had just arrived from 2018? His head ached with the effort and with exhaustion. He  _ had  _ just died, after all. Again.

 

He groaned softly, trying not to displace Buttercup or wake up Kravitz (who was now fast asleep with one long leg drawn up on the couch and an arm flung over his upturned face), and then slipped gracelessly out from underneath the quilt and stood and stretched. The fire in the woodstove was nearly out and gave out only the feeblest flicker of light, and Travis did not feel like bumbling around inside anymore. He suddenly felt claustrophobic in the cozy quarters. He wanted to be  _ out _ , beyond the walls, under stars as broad and dizzying as his own thoughts had been all night.

 

He picked up a knobbly blanket from the floor and draped it around his shoulders, letting himself out the front door as quietly as he could. The night air was cool but friendly and the restless souls in the Stockade seemed subdued, even melodic, their calls and chatters washed quiet over the sound of the waves.

 

As he turned off of the small footpath and onto the broad obsidian road, though, he became keenly aware of two things.

 

One, there were no stars in the astral plane.

 

Two, the water came alive at night.

 

At first, Travis thought it was bioluminescence, and he hurried to the shore to see it up close. Then he realized that the lights that wove through the ocean were not the muted blue-green he’d seen from jellyfish and algae, but a bright pure white that seemed to almost have form. More than that, the little lights broke the surface as frequently as they floated through it, jumping and diving into the air and plunging back down, circling other clusters of lights, repeating the dance. They seemed almost to be playing. 

 

_ What are they _ ? Travis wondered. He sat down in the sand, transfixed, and adjusted the blanket around him. Occasionally, an exploring light bobbed its way over to him, reaching out of the shallows to hover over his feet, his knees, to alight gently on his hair before shyly gliding back to the others. 

 

They were almost like fireflies, he thought. They weren’t bugs, though, didn’t have legs or wings or any of the other bits. Just little balls of light. He blinked. They were beautiful. He loved watching them.

 

He stretched out in the sand, pulled the blanket over himself, and fell asleep with his smiling face turned toward the lights in the water.

 

\--

 

Travis should have been more used to waking up with one cheek half-buried in the sand of the Eternal Shores, but nonetheless he jumped, disoriented, when Kravitz shook his shoulder a few hours later.

 

“Hello, chum,” Kravitz said. “We’ve got to go soon. I see you made some friends.”

 

“Hmm?” Travis raised his head and looked. Sure enough, a handful of dancing lights bobbed in the surf a few feet away. Upon seeing him awake they tripped and stumbled back out into the depths. They made no sound, but Travis thought they  _ moved  _ like a giggle. He got the distinct impression they had been much closer to him before Kravitz woke him up.

 

“Here,” Kravitz said, “I brought you this.” Travis sat up to receive the cup of coffee and immediately set into it, grateful. He settled himself cross-legged in the sand and faced the water full-on, shivering a little. The sky was just barely lightening to a soft ash grey. “Budge up,” Kravitz said, and curled his legs underneath himself to sit beside Travis, tugging a bit of the blanket over his lap. “I can’t warm you up,” he said, “but I can at least block the wind.”

 

“You’re not so cold as usual,” Travis said sleepily. He took another swig of coffee. Kravitz laughed a little. “I did spend a good bit of time standing directly next to the woodstove making the coffee. That’s probably it.” Kravitz leaned back, planting one arm behind Travis. Travis leaned into him a little.  _ Just for the warmth,  _ he told himself.

 

Kravitz turned his head to frown at him. “You have sand in your hair,” he said, and with his free hand reached across to brush it out. He paused just before making contact with Travis and Travis realized they’d never been quite this close before. Then Kravitz’s hand was in his hair, brushing out the sand and smoothing it back, and his palm lingered on Travis’ cheek for only a fraction of a second before he dropped it back to his lap and looked out at the water.

 

For some reason, Travis felt a flutter of nervous energy in his stomach. He chalked it up to the imminent trip to see Istus and cleared his throat.  _ Don’t start getting weird now,  _ he told himself.  _ You’ve had friends before. It’s normal. It’s fine. It’s just Death. It’s fine. _

 

“So what’s the plan?” he asked out loud. Kravitz chewed his lower lip a minute. “Well,” he said at last. “I’ll bring you to Istus. She’ll look for your thread. And from there…” He looked away, back toward the path to his quarters, away from the waves. Away from Travis.

 

“What is it?” Travis asked.

 

“From there, she decides if you have enough of a role to play that you stay in the world as a living man.”

 

“And if not?”

 

Kravitz smiled weakly but he would not meet Travis’ eye. “Well… the good news is, you’d get to come back here.”

 

Travis let out a long, low breath. Then he shrugged. “Okay.” He said. Kravitz turned his face to him, surprised. “Okay? Is that all?”

 

“Well, I mean. I’m already dead whether I like it or not. Fate is fate, I  _ guess _ , like I was never a big believer in predestination when I was on earth, but it does kind of seem like it’s out of my control now.” He shrugged again. “It is what it is. Is Istus nice?”

 

The question seemed to catch Kravitz off-guard. “She-- yes, she’s lovely.” He cut himself short and smiled sadly at Travis, standing and offering him his hand.

 

“Come on. It’s time to go.”


	7. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An expedition from the astral plane finally brings the boys where they actually want to be. Kravitz paces. Travis finds a hand to hold. Istus makes her pronouncement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello #bachelornation/#zonerboners/dedicated TAZ fans! Thanks for sticking with the story this far and for bearing with me through a long delay. I'm hoping we're back on track with regular scheduling. Stay tuned for more cuties!??

The Temple of Istus was not, as Travis had expected, in shambles. It was a tall, solid building that reminded him of the old Mission churches he’d seen when he and Teresa lived in Los Angeles. The plaster walls were painted a soft peach, glowing in the growing light from the east; dawn was breaking, bathing the dusty scenery around them in buttery light, transforming the craggy rock from an inhospitable waste to a breathtaking landscape rendered in shades of gold and ochre.

 

Travis took a deep breath of the cool morning air. He loved this hour of the day, whenever he was up early enough to experience it. Time felt elastic. The events of the day were still a pleasant mystery. As he looked out over the cliffs of the gulch, he realized they were looking down at a small town.

 

“Hey, Kravitz? Is that, um…” he searched for the name. “R-Respite? No, hold on. Repose?”

 

“Refuge,” Kravitz answered. His expression was clouded. “I don’t suppose I should ask how you came to be familiar with this place.”

 

“Yeah,” Travis agreed, “Probably better that you don’t.”

 

He turned from the sight of the small town below, its dusty streets unexpectedly busy with streams of people headed toward the opposite end of town, some of them pushing wheelbarrows, others bearing pickaxes that glinted in the morning light, others still carrying only a lunch pail or small satchel. Travis couldn’t hear them but by their manner they looked comfortable, if not jovial; they moved with a sense of purpose, knots of people forming to chat as they went, sometimes friendly nudges and playful punches exchanged between them.

 

“The mine’s still doing well, I take it,” he said.

 

Kravitz made a small noise of surprise, then cleared his throat hastily and said, “Yes, by all counts, the mine is flourishing.” He paused, searching Travis’ face. “As of now,” he continued, “there’s no sign that the diamond veins would run out. Certainly they’ve gone deep and far enough for the town to remain prosperous for the next several years at least.”

 

“Hmm,” Travis said. He had no idea how much of the story-- how much of this town’s  _ future _ \-- he was supposed to reveal. Or, really, what year it actually was in Refuge. Or anywhere else. He turned back toward the imposing double doors of the temple.

 

“Shall we?”

 

\--

 

Inside the temple it was dark and cool. Wide shafts of morning light carved through the quiet interior, illuminating drifting motes of dust and revealing a series of antique-looking wooden seats. Between the windows, the walls were decorated with woven tapestries depicting scenes of Refuge’s history-- one panel showed a few rough tents around a newly-worn road, the next a scene of triumphant miners discovering a ribbon of glimmering diamond in the stone, a third chronicling the construction of the temple itself.

 

_ Meta,  _ Travis thought.

 

Kravitz shifted out of the shadows, stepping past Travis and toward the altar. “Lady Istus?” he tried quietly. “Are you here?”

 

Travis heard a sound like a tinkle of laughter, and between the motes of dust a silhouette appeared, growing more substantial as he watched. A tall, stately woman of advancing years stood before him, her cascade of white hair shining like a halo in the streams of sunlight.

 

“Kravitz, my dear,” she said warmly. “The Queen did warn me of your coming.” She peered around him, her eyes crinkling good-naturedly at the sight of Travis. “And your friend, as well.”

 

Istus beckoned Travis closer with one rheumatic hand. The other, he saw, held a sort of carpetbag from which streamed loose threads and yarn of varying color. She smiled at Travis as he approached. “Your name, dear?”

 

“Travis Patrick McElroy,” he said almost automatically. It seemed moot; her eyes seemed to know him already.

 

“Just Travis is fine, though,” Kravitz added. Travis glanced over his shoulder to shoot him a smile. “Yeah. Plain old Travis is great,” he confirmed. Istus nodded. She took his hands in hers, the carpetbag settling silently onto the floor beside them. Her eyes were a pale gray, nearly silver, and sharper than her aging appearance would have suggested.

 

“I have been told why Kravitz brings you to me,” she said. “And I confess I too am fascinated by your journey. I have been the patron of many things, in the many incarnations I have borne, not least among them destiny-- which, I know, is why Kravitz has brought you here today.

 

“Although I do not know how I am represented in your world, or which aspect of mine you might be familiar with, but I can tell you that in this world I look after travelers.  _ Especially _ those set out on lonely paths.” She squeezed his hands.

 

“Do not be afraid,” she whispered.  _ I am with you. _

 

Travis wasn’t sure if it was his ears or his heart that had caught her last words, but the impression calmed him. He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding, his shoulders dropping at the release of tension.

 

“Thank you,” he said to her, sincerely, and her eyes sparkled.

 

She let go of his hands and beckoned Kravitz closer. He bowed as he approached. “My lady,” he said formally. They seemed like words meant for another place, another time.

 

Istus laughed. “Dear one, you know there is no need for such formalities!” And, to Travis’ surprise-- and apparently Kravitz’s as well-- she wrapped Kravitz in a warm embrace. She was a tall woman but her cheek only reached to his shoulder. As Kravitz returned the hug awkwardly, a moment later than would have been natural, Istus opened her eyes and winked at Travis. He grinned back. The gesture warmed him but he had no idea what it meant.

 

“Let me look at you,” Istus said, releasing him. “Morrigan tells me you are looking too thin but I wasn’t inclined to believe her. You know how she feels about meat on the bones.” They both laughed at some obscure joke. “You do look wan, though, dear. You had ought to stop by and see  Pálma. She misses you.” 

 

Kravitz dipped his head in acknowledgement. “And I have no doubt she will make up for lost time with a litany of baked goods,” he said wryly. 

 

Istus smiled warmly at him. “You know there is no such thing as lost time, Kravitz. We must all divide our hours by interest or obligation. It is mastering the balance that matters most.”

 

Kravitz seemed to remember Travis was there and shot him a quick glance. He looked embarrassed. 

 

“We do seek your counsel, Lady Istus,” he said, bowing his head. “As I am sure Mor-- the Raven Queen has told you, Travis seems to have some unfinished business which we can’t divine.” He glanced up at her. “No pun intended,” he amended hurriedly. Istus chuckled.

 

“The Raven Queen gave me an ultimatum,” he went on. “And I am afraid your ruling is the fulcrum upon which it rests. I would ask you to help us find Travis’ thread in your cloth, to determine if it is his time to come to rest, or if he does indeed have a path to walk which would stretch beyond the astral plane.” He glanced again at Travis, apology in his eyes. “I hope, Lady Istus,” he went on, “That you can help us sort through this riddle. It is my personal conviction that Travis should not yet be taken back and--” he swallowed, closing his eyes briefly. “--And made to join the waves.”

 

_ Oh,  _ Travis thought. So that was what was at stake. No wonder Kravitz hadn’t wanted to say it out loud; the idea of wading into those waters only to lose all consciousness and memories and never emerge whole again sent a cold shiver down Travis’ spine.

 

Istus clucked her tongue. She tilted her head, considering Kravitz. “Yes, the Queen told me that as well. And more.” She raised her eyebrows at him but Kravitz did not look up. Travis’s looked nervously between the two of them. “She tells me his story is not unlike that of your Bluejeans boy. Do you think that is an fair comparison?”

 

“There are certain similarities,” Kravitz admitted in a mumble.

 

“No sense delaying things, then,” Istus said. Her tone was brisk. Glancing back to her, Travis could swear she had grown younger, her posture straightening, fingers uncurling slightly from gnarled joints.

 

“Travis, dear,” she said, holding out a hand. “Come here, will you?” He took her hand and followed obediently as she lead him to the altar. He couldn’t help but feel like a sacrificial lamb. He took a deep breath to steady his nerves.

 

She pointed to a cushion on the floor. “Sit there for me, dear?” He did as he was told, folding his legs obediently. Kravitz began to pace between the rows of benches. He would not meet Travis’ eye.

 

Istus hummed softly as she collected her carpetbag and then seated herself beside Travis. She definitely looked younger now, he thought, her hair falling in a curtain over her newly smooth and un-lined face.

 

From the bag she produced a length of finely knit fabric, its volume suspiciously greater than the bag would seem to allow. She shook it out and smoothed the material over her knees. Up close, Travis could see that the fiber was so fine that the resulting cloth had an almost fluid quality. It seemed to shift between hues, reminding him of the pages he had seen in Kravitz’s Tome and of the multicolor waves of the astral plane-- though, at the memory of the waves, and the unwelcome returning thought of joining them forever as a disembodied echo of energy, the charming effect was somewhat lessened.

 

“Give me your hand, dear,” she murmured. He obliged. Istus’ hand was warm and she squeezed his gently. She closed her eyes and hummed again as her other hand hovered over the fabric, sometimes tugging it left or right, up or down, then letting her fingers rest just above it once more.

 

Her brow wrinkled. “Interesting,” she said. She opened her eyes and looked at her left hand, releasing Travis from her right. He followed her gaze.

 

Her fingers had landed on an edge-- no,  _ not _ an edge, Travis realized. A small wave of stitches rose from the flat cloth, the pattern warped slightly from the extra fabric. “An anomaly,” she said. She grinned at Travis, impish youth shining in her pale eyes.  “How strange. I must have added a few extra stitches to this row without realizing it.” She ran a fingertip over the ripple. “But look here, I corrected it a few rows later. No harm done.”

 

“And that’s-- that’s me?” Travis asked cautiously.

 

“Mm-hmm,” she murmured, attention still fixed on the stitches. “Yours and-- a few others. You have brothers, yes? Let’s see… two?”

 

“Yeah!” Travis said, taken aback. “Justin and Griffin.” He stopped himself from trying to spot their threads as well, hoping fervently that their stitches went on for many many rows beyond his own.

 

“Yes, there they are,” Istus said, almost to herself. “And your family. Oh, lovely.” She patted his knee, still not pulling her gaze away. “They will be fine, my dear, don’t worry. Great things ahead for your little one.”

 

His heart was pounding, Travis realized. He ran a hand over his cheek preemptively but the mist in his eyes did not overflow. “Thank you,” he whispered.

 

“Here you are,” Istus said. She ran her finger along a particular thread and Travis saw it illuminate, even as it ran under and between others. “Now, we--hm! What’s this?”

 

She folded the cloth over and, thanks to its faint glow, Travis could see where a loop of yarn had diverged from the rest of the stitching and stretched loosely into a different pattern on the other side.

 

“Ah,” Istus said. Her eyes were shining. “I see now. I really must work on my consistency.” She smiled at him again, plump cheeks now round with the vestiges of childhood.  _ She really is aging backward!  _ Travis thought.  _ Wish I could do that.  _ He then remembered his teenage self and dismissed the thought immediately.

 

“So?” Kravitz said. “What does it mean?” He had stopped pacing when Istus found the bump in her cloth and now loomed anxiously over the two of them. Istus gazed placidly back up at him.

 

“It is as you thought, dear,” she said. She began to pack away her knitting once more. “Travis’ work is not done.” She stood and offered a hand up to Travis, who was embarrassed at how much he needed the help up from the ground.

 

As he scrambled upright and dusted off his pants, Istus continued, “I believe the Queen’s terms were clear on your next steps, but don’t worry, my dear--” she squeezed Kravitz’s arm. “--It is all working out as it should.”

 

Now it was Kravitz who let out a relieved breath and embraced Istus, clumsily, but sincerely. They murmured an exchange which Travis could not catch, and as he turned away to give them privacy he was surprised to feel a cold arm slung enthusiastically over his shoulder.

 

“Guess I don’t dissolve you today,” Kravitz said. His gold-capped tooth flashed in his grin. A cocky lilt had colored the edges of his accent.

 

Travis smiled back. “That’s something, right?”

 

He looked back to Istus, appearing now to have progressed-- or regressed-- to a gangly preteen, and he blinked as she began to lose definition around her edges. She nodded serenely at them both.

 

“Visit me again soon, please, boys.” She said, “But next time, Kravitz?  _ Please _ don’t make me trek all the way to this plane. Now go see  Pálma. Send her my regards.”

 

“I will,” Kravitz said. A kind of frenzied warmth had returned to his tone. “I will. Thank you, Lady Istus.”

 

“Thank you!” Travis called to her fading form.

 

A moment passed, and all that remained was the distant sound of Istus’ laughter.

 

Kravitz squeezed Travis’ shoulders and dropped his arm. “Well,” he said. “Onto the next.”

 

“Which is what, exactly?”

 

Kravitz sighed and a little of the light seemed to go out of him. “Per the Raven Queen,” he said, “I am to take you to my home world and pair you with Barry, so that the two of you might uncover your purposes together.”

 

“Ah,” Travis said. He mulled over this. He had a notion of what his purpose could be, if the story was still to take place as he knew it, but he was stricken again with the uncertainty of whether to share his ideas with Kravitz. He turned over Kravitz’s words in his head.

 

“Wait,” Travis said aloud. “The Raven Queen. You called her something else back there. What was that?”

 

Kravitz’s expression soured. “Yes, well… I nearly called her Morrigan, which is her name. She does not like it being used outside of her presence, though. Much prefers the full title. I know she and Istus are friendly so I don’t need Istus witnessing anything more familiar there than truly exists. Frankly there is a certain... professional barrier, I suppose, that I do not care to cross.”

 

“With the Raven Queen, you mean?” Travis prompted. “Why? Do you not get along? Isn’t she your boss? I mean, I haven’t really gotten along with some of my bosses, either, but I kinda figured you would just, like, evolve to a point in your career where you would be cool with ‘em. You know. You’re successful, they’re successful. You have a lot in common!”

 

He knew he was rambling, but he kept talking in the hopes that something would unlock the mask that Kravitz had seemingly put up.

 

Finally, Kravitz mumbled, “It’s not about getting along. It’s about… well, defining your boundaries.” He met Travis’ eyes at last. “Like Istus said. You have to balance interest and obligation. Except, in this instance, the equation is tipped entirely to obligation on my part and interest on hers.”

 

“And she doesn’t like that,” Travis interjected.

 

“To say the least,” Kravitz conceded with a cold smile. “No, she doesn’t like that much at all. But, I am afraid, what she wants…. I-- I can’t provide.” His pained expression and closed, embarrassed posture told Travis far more than his words did. Then it clicked.

 

“Oh!” Travis said. “Because you’re gay!”

 

Kravitz’s head snapped up and he whipped around to look at Travis.

 

“I-- Excuse me?!”

 

Travis shrugged. “Not a big deal, bro. A lot of people are gay! Some of my favorite people, actually. Sometimes people think I am, too. It’s cool.”

 

Kravitz was staring at him, violet eyes impossibly wide. After a few seconds of trying to find his words, he finally managed, “So you-- I suppose-- you know this because of your-- your history with-- or, rather-- because of your story?”

 

“Yep!” Travis said. “Seriously, it’s not a big deal.” In an attempt to add levity to the situation, he leaned in and, waggling his brows, whispered, “I even know who you end up with.”

 

“Alright, time to go!” Kravitz said loudly, already striding away. Travis hurried to follow him out the door.

 

As they stepped into the bright sunlight, he was stuck with a sudden thought.

 

“Oh no, Kravitz!” he cried, stopping. Kravitz did not turn around. “We left Buttercup behind!” Travis went on. “I can’t believe I did that! What a dumb, dumb thing. Kravitz! What are we gonna do?”

 

Kravitz had finally stopped, and turned, and was scrutinizing Travis from some distance away. “I’ll get her,” he said at last. “I don’t think it makes sense for us both to go back to the astral plane before I bring you to Barry.”

 

“What about me?” Travis asked. He tried very hard not to whine, but in truth, he hated the thought of being left alone.

 

“We have one more stop to make. I’ll bring you there, and you can wait for me to return with Buttercup.”

 

“Okay.” Travis said. “I can’t believe I left her behind. I’m a fucking idiot.” Embarrassment and anger welled up in him, eclipsing the relief he had so recently felt at Istus’ pronouncement. Poor Buttercup had been through just as much as he had, and by her nature would only want to be at his side through their weird travels, but he had forgotten her entirely when it came time to set plans in motion. Travis shook his head, the shame he felt burning a brand across his cheeks.

 

Kravitz stepped closer, and reached out to pat his shoulder. “It will be fine,” Kravitz said. There was still some awkwardness in his tone. Travis stared at his face until Kravitz finally met his eyes.

 

“Hey,” Travis said. He cleared his throat, trying to see beyond his disappointment in himself, trying to make something right out of the wretched way he felt. “Look, I’m really sorry about before. About… outing you. It’s a sensitive thing, I know, I’m just not always great at being a sensitive person. I try, but I mean…” He gestured emptily. “Sometimes I have to work for it. I just wanted you to know, y’know,  _ I  _  know, and it’s, like,  _ so  _ not a problem. Not for me, not in general. At all. Okay?”

 

“Sure,” Kravitz said. Some of the tension had left him. “It’s just-- not many people know. My family. None of my, uh... coworkers.” He heaved a great sigh. “Which is to say, practically no one has had any idea about me for the last couple hundred years. Except, well…”

 

“What?” Travis prompted.

  
Kravitz flashed a glinting smile at him. “You’ll see,” he said.


	8. Chapter Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kravitz runs an errand. Travis feels at home. A new friend dispenses sage advice and scones. Buttercup has adventures off-screen, probably.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Slowly but surely getting back into a regular posting schedule-- I'm sorry for the delay! I've been traveling a lot and that makes it hard, sometimes, but your comments and kudos mean the world to me!
> 
> Content-wise, I hope you all like Paloma as much as I do, because this chapter has more Paloma than a scone has berries. Originally her part was only planned for half a chapter but she's just too fun to write. :B Thank you for reading! Enjoy!!

Kravitz led Travis on a winding trek down the hillside and into an ever-densening wood which gradually gave way to a full-blown forest. Although he had been too distracted by the pronouncement of his fate to take notice earlier, Travis now noticed-- and appreciated-- the sturdy boots and comfortable walking attire he’d been granted by traveling through the rift to Istus’ temple. True, the ensemble was a bit odd, the boots a weathered buckskin, and the loose shirt and pants constructed of some kind of khaki linen, but they were comfortable and practical for the growing heat of the day. Travis especially liked the red kerchief he’d discovered tied jauntily beneath his beard.

 

“Hey, Krav,” he said as they climbed their way down a zagging bit of path, “Where’d my clothes come from?”

 

Kravitz spared a moment to inspect Travis from over his shoulder as he lead on. “Do you like them?”

 

“Oh, absolutely! Though I think my favorite would probably have to be the suit from when we were in LA.” Kravitz nodded but did not turn again. “I like this too, though!” Travis hastened to add. 

 

“I’m glad,” Kravitz said lightly. “I thought you would. I make them. Sometimes it eases the travel process.”

 

“You  _ make  _ them?”

 

He shrugged. “Well, sure. I told you I can control matter in the astral plane. The rift is a function of my own energy so it’s easy enough to outfit a passenger as you move through. Besides, I’ve always liked design.”

 

“Wow,” Travis said. He was quiet for a moment, thinking. “Wait, hold on,” his tone turned incredulous. “If you could have just made me clothes, like,  _ any _ time, why did you make me wear your robe the first night you found me? Or, or, Barry’s damn blue jeans?”

 

Now Kravitz shrugged, non-committal. “I wasn’t sure if you would be worth the trouble.”

 

“Ouch.”

 

“Hey,” Kravitz said, “At least I was wrong.”

 

\--

 

They came at last to the bottom of the hill and, waiting beneath it, a small clearing. There, rising up from the ground as if it too was part of the forest, was a small round log-and-stone cabin. Its walls and thatched roof were edged in green from the thick curls of vines that climbed its sides and trailed lazily back down, half of them bearing fat white or pink blossoms. The light and heat of the day had not quite reached them here yet in the heart of the forest and the air felt cool. A few fuzzy fantasy bees buzzed drowsily among the the flowers. 

 

Travis felt the pervading peace of the place deep in his veins, and he was glad for it.

 

“Buttercup would love this,” he said remorsefully. “She loves the woods.” A red bird on a nearby branch chipped and trilled in response, then flew off.

 

“Don’t worry,” Kravitz said. “She’ll be here soon. I’ll make sure she has a chance to run around.”

 

“Thanks,” Travis responded. He chucked Kravitz’s shoulder lightly. “You know, I never would have guessed that Death is a dog guy.”

 

Kravitz just shrugged, trying and failing to stifle a crooked smile. Travis thought back to the first night he’d arrived, to Kravitz’s awkward bearing and the discomfort with which he carried on any kind of conversation beyond his job description.  _ Leaps and bounds,  _ Travis thought.

 

They stopped in front of the arched front door and Kravitz raised his knuckles to knock, but the door swept open in front of them before he could. He paused, one hand raised, and glanced at Travis.

 

_ “Late!”  _ said the little woman in front of them. She dusted plump hands free of flour on her frilly apron and planted her fists firmly on her hips.

 

“I bake all day for you,  _ Vitzchke _ , and all night I keep the scones warm, I think, oh, poor Vitchke, probably got very busy with the dead people again, oh no! He got busy with a  _ boy _ . Maybe, maybe,  _ maybe _ , maybe someday you think of your poor auntie, yes?”

 

“Hello, frænka,” Kravitz said, chastened. “I’m sorry.” The woman’s cheeks were flushed in her lined brown face, but dark eyes sparkled playfully above them, belying the humor behind her exaggerated glare.

 

“Well, okay, I forgive you. Come in, come in!” Her accent was unusual, Travis thought, though he didn’t know enough about dialects to place it.  _ Maybe Eastern European, or, like-- Danish?  _ As he thought the last word, his stomach rumbled, brain all too eager to jump to the associated pastry.

 

“Frænka  Pálma, this is my friend Travis,” Kravitz said, following the woman inside. He had to duck to fit through the door.   


  
“This I know!” she said, busying herself at the stove with an enamel teapot suspiciously similar to the one Kravitz kept in the astral plane. “And Travis is hungry, yes? I do not need to be a witch to know this, I have ears, and Travis has a belly.”

 

She moved very quickly despite her roundness and in a flash she placed herself in front of Travis where he stood awkwardly just inside the door. She beamed up at him and patted his stomach in a fond, familiar way.  “Hello, Travis,” she said. Her accent made his name sound almost musical.  _ Tray-viss.  _ He liked her immediately. 

 

“Welcome to my kitchen. No worry, I have plenty scone for you too. You can call me auntie, or just Paloma. Vitzchke still uses the old way but that’s nobody’s language anymore except for us. Paloma will do just fine. Scone?”

 

“Uh, yeah,” Travis said. “Sure!”

 

She gestured him to a little table toward the middle of the room where, he realized, three places were already set. He opted for the sole seat on the broad side of the table, leaving the plates at each end for Kravitz and Paloma. He felt most comfortable in the middle, anyway.

 

Paloma was back in a moment, setting a plate in front of him laden with a pair of fluffy scones, a hot pad of butter slowly melting over each. This she followed with a hearty mug of some aromatic tea. “Eat, eat!” she urged.

 

“ Frænka,” Kravitz said hesitantly, “I can’t sit down just yet. I have an errand to run. Can Travis stay here with you awhile?”

 

Paloma crossed her arms and appraised him through narrowed eyes. “How long it has been since your last visit, hmm, Vitzchke? And already you leave again?” She flapped her hands outward in a gesture of defeat. “Fine! Go! I will try not to miss you so terribly, who knows when you will come back!”

 

“I won’t be long, auntie,” Kravitz said, and he crossed to her in two long strides and stooped down to wrap her in a hug.

 

“What is this!” she cried, “My own  frændi Vitzchke offers me hugging! I do not even must chase him all around the forest first to get even just a handshake? Madness!” She laughed delightedly and hugged him back, kissing him on both cheeks. “Ay, so cold still.” She released him but reached up to place her hands on either side of his face. “Be fast, Vitzchke, yes? Big lunch for you when you come back.”

 

He placed his hands over hers. “I’ll be fast,” he said, “I promise.” And with a smile for her and wave to Travis, he was out the door and gone.

 

Paloma sighed, sitting down at the head of the table. She waved a hand and a large platter covered in a lacy teacloth lifted off from the sideboard and hovered over to her. It stopped in mid-air and she lifted the cloth, selected a scone from underneath, and munched it thoughtfully. With another wave the platter found its way to Travis. Never one to say no to baked goods, he selected another and set to mopping up the leftover butter from his first two.

 

“Always that boy is leaving,” she said, unprompted. “Little Vitzchke was so small when he lost his  _ pabbi _ , my brother, he was always so serious after.” She looked at Travis now and quirked a brow. “At least now he hugs! Who knows how that happened, hmm? Always before I had to wring a hug from him like blood from the stone.”

 

“You’re his aunt, then?”

 

She laughed. “Yes, yes, Travis, I am. That is what he means when he calls me  frænka. It is the old way.”   


  
“But I thought that he said-- wait.” Travis furrowed his brow, thinking. Kravitz had mentioned that he and Barry were from the same homeworld, which meant Paloma probably was too. But then, if he remembered right, that was a different world than the one which held Refuge and the Temple of Istus. So at some point Paloma must have crossed between worlds. He tried to choose his next words carefully. “I thought Kravitz said he was from a different world-- different from this one, I mean. Are you from that world too?”

 

“A very good question,” Paloma said seriously. “And the answer holds a very good story. But I will let Vitzchke tell it. It is more of his business than mine, yes?”

 

“Sure,” Travis said. “Okay.”

 

Paloma must have sensed his disappointment. “Travis, Travis, don’t worry!” she said, “I know how it is confusing. I truly do. You have seen-- how to say? You have seen many stories, written on different sides of the same page, hm? And you see the margins of them too, yes?”

 

Travis  _ hmm _ ed. “I suppose so,” he said, slowly, then a light went off. “Wait! Do you mean the white place? The-- the place between places, or whatever?”

 

She steepled her fingers and leaned back, looking proud. “Yes, Travis, very good. Have scone.” The tray swooped toward him again. “You have seen the place too, yes? It leaves--” she traced a hand through the air. “--a kind of sparkles, yes? I see on you the sparkles.”   


  
“Wow,” Travis said, heart lifting at the chance of understanding. “So you’ve been there too.”

 

“Yes, yes,” she responded. “How did it appear to be for you, I wonder? For me it was a TV.”   


  
“Wait, what?”   


  
She raised an eyebrow. “A TV, you know, a Traveling Van? The same kind my family used to take when I was so small. From the back I read fortunes, town to town, yes?”

 

Travis couldn’t help but laugh. “So when you say-- when someone from this world says ‘TV’ they mean, like, a caravan?”   


  
“A caravan, yes, sure. Traveling Van, TV, rolls off the tongue, hmm?”

 

“It does,” he agreed. “So have you always read fortunes?”   
  
“Oh, yes,” she said comfortably. “It is good way to make living.” She gestured upward with her chin. “Vitzchke shows me how to make my thoughts and prophecies into these crystals. A little extra magic.”

 

Travis followed her gaze and saw, for the first time since entering the little cabin, hundreds of shimmering tear-shaped crystals hanging from the high rafters of the ceiling. 

 

“Oh, wow,” he breathed. He remembered now the description Griffin had given them during their campaign, but the effect in person was truly otherworldly. The dappled sunlight of the forest filtering through the tall windows seemed concentrated on the faceted drops of stone, each of them a slightly different color, many of them refracting the light into pale rainbows across the walls and floor of the little cottage. Travis was amazed he hadn’t noticed it before.

 

In fact, now that he was no longer distracted by the uncertainty of his own fate, and the confusion of where Kravitz was taking them as they headed into the woods, or even his own hunger, he was able to fully appreciate Paloma’s little nest. In a way, it reminded him of Kravitz’s surprisingly cozy quarters off of the Eternal Stockade, but where Kravitz’s apartments had been crowded with comfortable furnishings and dimmed by its dearth of windows, Paloma’s rounded walls and high ceiling gave the impression of a life carved from the airy insides of an oversized acorn. The windows were arched like the front door, and they stretched up toward the roof; the floors were a scrubbed beechy yellow and warmed by a few well-placed braided rugs. Her kitchen took up most of the main room, its focal point being a large  potbelly oven, and the tall shelves and cubbies built into the wall held baskets and covered trays filled with (Travis could only assume) several years’ supply of baked sundries.

 

“You have a lovely home,” he told Paloma, and he meant it.

 

She beamed at him. “Thank you, Travis. Please, make yourself comfortable. We have some time, I think.”

 

“Yeah,” Travis said. “I’m comfortable here, though! You can totally get back to whatever you were doing, I don’t want to get in your way or anything.”

 

She flapped a hand at him. “Pah, please. Today all I have plan to do is wait on Vitzchke.” She tapped a finger to her nose. “I know he was coming today, but not exactly the when.”   


  
“I see,” Travis said. He knew better, at this point, than to doubt her abilities as a witch. Nonetheless he was fascinated by the idea of her precognition and had to restrain himself from asking all about how it worked and what its boundaries were.

 

Before he could speak, though, Paloma said, “You have questions, yes? You can ask me anything, I will answer if I can.” She leaned over and patted his hand. “No charge for prophecies, not for friend of my frændi.”

 

He grinned at her. “Thanks! I guess I was wondering… well, I mean, there’s a lot that I’m wondering.” He tried to quiet his swarming mind to focus on just one question. “So, to start with, I guess, like-- why didn’t Istus tell me more about my fate in this world, or what exactly it is I’m here to do? My purpose, or whatever?”  _ That will have to do for now,  _ he thought,  _ even though it barely scratched the surface of how I got here in the first place or why-- or how-- I died. _

 

Paloma gazed at him steadily, but he could tell her mind was far away. Finally, she said. “You have a word, where you are from-- ‘spoilers,’ yes? Lady Istus does not give spoilers.”

 

“But I already know what happens,” Travis insisted. “It’s pretty crazy, and maybe you already know this, but I come from a different world entirely-- before I landed in the astral plane, I mean-- and in that world my brothers and I made a kind of story, but apparently that story is real. You were in it!”

 

She laughed, delighted. “Yes, yes, like I said. Many stories, written on different sides of the same page. Sometimes the ink bleeds through. But that does not mean the stories write each other, hmm?”

 

“Uh. I guess not?”

 

“Just so. And sometimes hands that writes the story writes from the brain, and sometimes the hands write from the heart. An… autobiography, you say.”

 

“Okay,” Travis said. In its own weird way, it almost made sense. Sort of.

 

Paloma puffed out her cheeks in a little sigh, and leaned forward again to take his hand. “Travis, look. You make a story with your brothers, yes? And your brothers-- they are the spirit, and they are the brain. But you speak with the same voice to tell the story. You see?”   
  


“Kind of,” Travis conceded.

 

“First the spirit, and the brain, but between them?” She tapped his chest. “The  _ heart _ , Travis. That is you.” She leaned back, apparently satisfied.

 

“I’m the heart?”

 

She nodded.

 

A moment passed, and then another.

 

“Okay, I tell you what,” Paloma said. “Maybe I do not make so much sense, by myself. I give you a prophecy.”

 

“Oh, you don’t have to do that--!”

 

She shushed him with a wave of her hand, and-- with a snap eerily reminiscent of her nephew’s gestures-- there was a tinkling noise from the rafters, followed a moment later by an explosion of a large crystal shattering on the table.

 

Paloma went stiff, her eyes rolling back half-closed, and spoke in a voice unlike her own. 

 

“The man in the high tower builds his empire by selfish hunger, but selfishness will not be overcome by one alone,” she intoned. “Your failure is not your future. Bring the bonds into being and they will do what you could not. Seven birds will need a nest.”

 

Her shoulders slumped and she exhaled slowly, leaning back in her chair. She blinked and opened her eyes to find Travis staring at her. She smiled cheerfully. “Well! That helped, maybe, yes?”

 

“Maybe,” Travis said dubiously. He was aware of having gained information but he felt more confused than he had before. He sat, silent, going over her words.

 

“Another scone?” Paloma asked.

 

“Ah-- no, no thank you.” He shook his head, still contemplating. Paloma got up, then turned and studied him. “Travis,” she said softly, accent drawing out the word. “It all comes back to the bonds, you see? The bonds like Istus weaves into her knitting, the bonds that hold us all together. You and me, we have a bond, yes? And me and my Vitzchke, and  _ you  _ and my Vitzchke. They make us strong. You have a gift, Travis, the gift of your heart. You draw these bonds out and help in weaving them.”

 

“Sure,” he said. “Okay.”

 

“Okay,” Paloma repeated. She sounded frustrated, but not angry. He could feel her concern and affection from across the room. He saw her shrug a little as she turned away, and then she opened the door.

 

On the front step stood Kravitz, hand raised as if to knock, mild surprise written on his handsome features. A wriggling, panting Buttercup was in his arms. 

 

“Hello, Vitzchke,” Paloma said. “Come in, come in, give your poor old auntie another hug, yes?”   
  
Kravitz set Buttercup down on the floor and she ran, skidding and slipping, toward Travis. He was already kneeling, holding his arms out for her, and she leapt into them. He didn’t even try to stop the thousand licks she laid on his face.

 

From the corner of his eye, Travis could see Kravitz leaning down to give Paloma a brief hug. Buttercup, sensing his distraction, found his wandering eye and tried to lick it. “Alright, alright,” he told her, laughing. Having her back set his heart at ease. “Sorry I almost forgot you,” he whispered into the scruff of her neck. “I promise I won’t do it again.” Buttercup whined and wheezed and pushed her nose happily into his hair.

 

“A boy and his dog!” Paloma said fondly. “So very sweet. I miss the having of a little hundur of my own.” She nudged Kravitz. “You remember Ólafur?”

 

Kravitz grimaced. “Ólafur tried to tear my leg off any chance he got.”

 

“Yes, but never he succeeded,” Paloma said indulgently. She now knelt down beside Travis and scratched Buttercup behind the ear. “Such a beautiful lady, isn’t she! What is her name?”

 

“Buttercup,” Travis said. He smiled at Paloma. Any dog person was a good person to know, he figured.

 

“Buttercup!” she repeated, and her eyes crinkled up in a smile. She clapped her hands together. “Back home, the word for buttercup we call Sóley. Is also what we call the island where I grew up and Vitzchke was born, off of what is called the Menagerie Coast. The Sunny Isle.” Her accent got thicker as she reminisced, Travis noticed.

 

“Oh! I nearly forget,” Paloma said, standing, “I have a little gift for you.” She bustled to the back of the cabin and nimbly scaled a ladder into a small sleeping loft. 

 

“You don’t have to get me anything!” Kravitz protested.

 

“Not for  _ you _ !” She called down. A parcel wrapped in brown paper came whistling down from where she was perched and bounced off Kravitz’s chest with a soft  _ whumph _ . He crossed his arms. 

 

“I believe that’s for you,” he told Travis coolly.

 

Travis grinned at him. “Aw, are you feeling left out?” He shooed Buttercup away from where she was snuffling the package and picked it up. It had an odd give to it.

 

“ _ Is _ this for me?” he called up to Paloma.

 

“Of course it is!” she called back, “and  _ you _ can cheer up, Vitzchke, you spoiled boy.” Kravitz  _ humph _ ed.

 

“Go ahead and open it,” she told Travis as she climbed back down. He undid the wrapping and shook out the fabric inside, revealing a soft woolen cable-knit sweater in a rich shade of plum.

 

“Try it on, try it on,” Paloma urged. “I mean, I know it fits, of course, I  _ am  _ a witch, but I want to see!”

 

Travis, obliging, pulled it over his head. It did in fact fit perfectly. He tugged the hem down and smoothed his hair.

 

“So nice!” Paloma exclaimed, running her hand down one sleeve. “I knit it for you myself. I did not know who it was Vitzchke was bringing, of course, but my hands tell me always what size to make. You like it?”

 

“I love it!” Travis said. It had to be the softest, warmest thing he’d ever worn. “Thank you so much, auntie Paloma.” He wrapped her in a hug and kissed her cheek, making her blush and squawk, but he could see how pleased she was. “You see, Vitzchke,  _ this _ is a nice boy!”

 

Kravitz raised an eyebrow at them, arms still crossed.

 

Paloma  _ tsk _ ed at him. “Everybody likes sweaters, Vitzchke, you should know this. Are you not knitting anymore like I showed you?”

 

He shrugged noncommittally. “I mostly crochet, I suppose.”

 

“Always with the one needle, you! When will you listen when I tell to you, working it out with two is better than one.”

 

A flush of color not unlike Travis’ new sweater was winding its way across Kravitz’s impressive cheekbones. Travis glanced from him to Paloma, who caught his eye and winked.

  
  
“For the knitting, I mean, of course. Knitting, two needles, good strong sweater. Crochet, only one, pah! Lonely.”   


  
“Good for blankets, though,” Travis added, trying to distract Kravitz from his aunt’s double entendre.

 

From somewhere near the rafters came a soft, oddly familiar giggle. Travis looked around for its source.

 

Paloma, seeing him looking, shook her head. “It’s just Istus,” she said, “she left present here for Vitzchke last time she came over for scone. I’ll get it.” She rolled her eyes. “So nosy, Lady Fate is,  _ so  _ nosy.”

 

She huffed and headed back up the ladder while Buttercup jumped her front legs onto Travis to better sniff the new sweater. A second package came flying down from the loft and, this time, Kravitz caught it.

 

“Is  _ this  _ one for me?”

 

“Yes, yes, you spoil-y boy,” Paloma huffed. “From Istus, like I say. Go on! Open it.”

 

Unwrapping it carefully, Kravitz shook out a sweater nearly identical to Travis’, though somewhat longer and more narrow.

 

The tinkle of laughter carried on the breeze grew into a guffaw, and was gone.

 

“She really is too much,” Kravitz said flatly, while Paloma cackled.

 

\--

 

It was too soon, Travis thought, before Kravitz was nudging them towards the door. Part of him wanted to stay in Paloma’s little cabin forever; he felt more at peace here than he had since he had left home (he decided that’s how he would think of it, going forward:  _ left home _ ) and the prospect of what was coming next created a yawning chasm of anxiety in the pit of his stomach.

 

But then Paloma was pushing a basket into Kravitz’s arms (“For Barry,” she informed him, “You tell that boy I miss him, he should come to visit me sometime.”) and handing Travis a tiny green glass bottle with an ornate stopper.

 

“What’s this?” he asked.

 

“One more little gift, that’s all!”

 

“Is it… some kind of-- some kind of potion? Or…?”   
  
She laughed and clapped her hands together. “No, no, is not potion. Is beard oil!” and then she placed her palms on either side of his face and looked in his eyes, her expression serious. “Is  _ scratchy _ ,” she whispered.

 

He grinned and pocketed it. “Thank you, auntie Paloma.” He bent down a bit so she could kiss his cheeks.

 

“You come back and visit too, okay? I will miss you as well. I add you to long list of my boys I am always missing. Vitzchke, his Barry, now you…”

 

“I will if I can,” Travis replied. “But, I don’t know--”

 

She shook her head. “Don’t think too hard about it, Travis. Will be okay.”   
  
“Paloma, before we go, there’s something I think I should tell you.”   
  
She arched an eyebrow at him. “Spoilers?”   
  
“No, no.” He searched for the words. “It’s something that I think you will already-- you will already have known-- in the future, you will have already known it, so I think maybe it’s up to me to tell you?”

 

She nodded at him approvingly. “Such is the way of knowing what is to come, Travis, is very good. You will get hang of it.”   
  
He smiled at her. “Okay. So, in the future--” he stopped and turned to Kravitz. “I actually think you might need to cover your ears for this part,” he said. Being a harbinger of the future was complicated.   
  
Kravitz shrugged. “Buttercup and I can wait outside.”   
  
Once the door had closed behind them, Travis went on. “Paloma, in the future, time will be-- time will be  _ sick  _ here, in Refuge. At the beginning of it, a man in a red robe will bring two new people to the town, a man and a little girl. The man in the red robe-- or, maybe, like, a red jacket?-- anyway, the man in the red will have something he needs to hide. He’s going to be scared, Paloma, so if you meet him, be kind to him like you were to me, okay?” 

 

He was surprised to find himself choking up thinking of Magnus, his own character creation-- at least, who he thought of as his own character creation-- coming into this very cabin alone and afraid.

 

“Is okay,” Paloma assured him. “I will watch for red man and be kind. Maybe he likes scone, yes?”

 

“Yeah,” Travis said, smiling a little despite the lump in his throat. “The thing is, he’s going to come back after-- after time becomes sick here, but he’s not going to remember ever having been here before. You can’t tell him that you remember him. His brain isn’t going to let him believe it. But he’s going to have friends with him, a dwarf named Merle and an elf named Taako, and they’ll need help to help set the town to rights. The man in the red-- well, he won’t be in the red anymore when he comes back, but-- his name is Magnus. Does that all make sense?”

 

“Yes, Travis,” Paloma whispered. “I know the bubble. I have seen it, sometimes, when the prophecies come. And the little girl. I know.  She grows old but she is young. Both, forever, at least for a little while. Not unlike our Istus, hmm?”   
  
“Exactly,” Travis said, relieved. “Hey, why does Istus do that, anyway? Cycle between old and young?”   
  
“Would you not be doing the same thing, if you could?”   
  
He chuckled and she kissed him on both cheeks once more. “Scratchy,” she said, shaking her head, and then she took his hand and led him out to where Kravitz and Buttercup waited beyond.


	9. Chapter Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kravitz answers quite a few questions. Travis shows his heart. Buttercup makes a leap, despite her better judgment. Barry Bluejeans makes his nondescript debut.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, my loves! Look at that, an on-time chapter. <3 Thank you all so much for your readership. We are coming into the second act and things start to move a little faster. Yikes! Thanks for hanging in there. You're my very favorite.

The sun was rising high, burning into the day. Travis had to immediately take off the sweater Paloma had given him, as much as he truly loved it; he was glad now for the loose linen trousers and tunic that the rift-- or, rather, Kravitz-- had outfitted him with, although he found that he suddenly, keenly understood the appeal of pith helmets. Also, sunglasses.

 

Kravitz had set them out toward town, explaining that he’d set up a portal to their destination. Apparently it wasn’t just time and history that held waypoints. “There are places between worlds where the edges overlap,” Kravitz told Travis. “The same pub, for example, might exist in the same place in the Prime Material Plane, in the Plane of Thought, and in the variations of those worlds that exist in separate dimensions.”

 

“Like where we’re headed,” Travis guessed. Kravitz nodded. “Right. We’re currently on the Prime Material Plane for this dimension, but the-- the veil, I guess, between dimensions is thinner where we’re headed. So we’re headed for the same spot, different world. Does that make sense?”

 

“Actually, yeah!” Travis said.  _ Finally _ , he thought. And so they continued on through the forest and toward the town.

 

Buttercup, as Travis had predicted, was overjoyed to be in the woods. She had rarely gotten to run around outside in Cincinnati. The few off-leash dog parks they visited tended to be sandy and shadeless and Buttercup was in her element now, darting between tree shadows, rolling in the duff, and occasionally stopping abruptly to prick her ears and sniff at birdsong or a bustle in the undergrowth. Every few yards she would glance back, tongue lolling, tail wagging, and return to the two men to have her ears scratched and her rump patted before charging off again.

 

“I really think I’m going to miss that dog,” Kravitz said wistfully.

 

“Well, you can come visit her any time!” Travis said. “I mean, I don’t know anyone where we’re going. And we’re-- we’re friends, right?”

 

Kravitz met his gaze and held it a beat longer than was strictly necessary. “Yes. Friends. Of course we are.”

 

“So you can come visit me! And Barry. Boy’s night!”

 

“I wish I could, Travis,” Kravitz said. He spoke slowly, as though the words were coals in his mouth. “But I never should have even seen Barry, after I returned him to his-- to our-- world.. The Raven Queen is watching me more closely now. She’s-- I’ve been forbidden to continue contact with you. Either of you.”

 

Travis stopped walking.

 

“I thought you said you were done with her rules,” Travis said. “In for a penny in for a pound, or whatever.”

 

Kravitz shook his head. “It’s not that simple, Travis, I’m sorry.”

 

“Well, why didn’t you say something before?!”

 

“Before what?” Kravitz asked, his tone cooling. “Before I risked my job and my life to see to it that you weren’t imprisoned or dissolved before your work was done? Before I brought you with me to have Istus read your fate and provided you with every comfort, going out of my way to help you figure out what the hell is going on?” He rubbed a hand across his cheek, his forehead, pushed the heel of his palm against his eye.

 

Travis could see he was agitated but nothing in him was inclined towards being conciliatory, not now. His gut roiled with fear-- fear of the new world he was supposed to live in, sight unseen, fear of being left by the one ally he felt he had gained in this whole mess. His face grew hot, his chest ached, and he gave the fear a new name:  _ anger. _

 

“You can’t just leave me there!” Travis shouted. “What the fuck! I’ve been through so much, I didn’t even get enough time--”

 

“You get what anybody gets,” Kravitz snapped. “You get a lifetime.”

 

“Oh yeah? What lifetime is that, Kravitz? My life on earth that got cut short? Or this stupid new one where I’m supposed to take care of a bunch of-- a bunch of goddamn fictional fantasy characters?!”

 

Kravitz stepped toward him and fell very still. For the first time since they had faced off against John in future Los Angeles, Travis saw the flames kindling in the pits of Kravitz’s eyes. His handsome face fell away and was replaced only by the death’s-head he’d worn the very first time they had met. Travis faltered.

 

“Would you prefer I take you now?” Kravitz growled. Something in his voice held an echo like the sound of stone on stone. “You do not need to  _ take _ your second chance, Travis McElroy. It is given to so few. Perhaps I was mistaken in believing you deserved it.”

 

“I-- I want…” Travis fumbled. He was not used to being lost for words. “I do want it. My second chance.”

 

Kravitz did not move, looming over Travis, nearly chest-to-skeletal-chest, the flames of his eyes dancing only inches away. 

 

“I’m sorry,” Travis said at last.

 

Still Kravitz did not move, the bones and hollows of his face unchanging.

 

“Kravitz?”

 

Now Buttercup had circled back to them and sat watching, head cocked. She barked once, twice, and-- not getting the response she wanted-- pushed her way to Kravitz nosed his fingers, shoving her face into his hand, giving the licks and gentle bites that Travis knew meant she wanted attention.

 

“Buttercup, leave it,” he told her. But she seemed to have shaken Kravitz out of his angry reverie and he stepped backwards, away from Travis. Kravitz knelt down to pet her and she immediately rolled over for a belly rub, tail clearing leaves in a broad semicircle around them. He scratched her and then, remembering her first favorite chew toy, detached one skeletal hand and tossed it a few feet away for her to retrieve.

 

He stood again and faced Travis, his features gradually resuming their humanity, skull fading to smoke and memory beneath them.

 

“I’m sorry,” Travis said again.

 

“I--” Kravitz said, and stopped. He sounded oddly choked. “Travis, you should know-- I mean, you  _ must  _ know…”   
  
He shook his head. He took a step toward Travis and placed a cold hand against Travis’ face, thumb just brushing the corner of his lips. The now-handless wrist of his other arm pressed the back of Travis’ neck, bringing him in close. 

 

He paused there, the chill of his skin permeating the air between them, and Travis was suddenly very aware of his own fast, shallow breathing. Kravitz’s eyes were burning again, but not with the ghastly red of his earlier fury; instead, they sparked and shimmered in the sad depths of his very human eyes.

 

“Um, Kravitz…”   
  
He smiled ruefully at Travis, their faces mere inches apart. “I know.”

 

He sighed, a habit Travis had come to realize was purely decorative, dropped his arms, and put distance between them. Travis watched him for a moment, heart pounding with the nearness of a different timeline, a different  _ outcome _ , and then impulsively launched himself forward and wrapped his arms around Kravitz’s lithe middle in a ferocious hug. 

 

Kravitz, surprised, made a small  _ oof  _ noise and gradually, gingerly, folded his arms around Travis’ shoulders in turn. A moment later a cool cheek came to rest gently against Travis’ hair.

 

“I’m sorry I can’t-- well. I’m sorry.” Travis said in a rush. “I  _ do  _ really appreciate everything you’ve done for me. I never would have expected to find a friend here. I never would have expected any of this.”

 

“It’s okay,” Kravitz said, his voice soft. “I… I wasn’t expecting this either.”

 

Travis laughed and released him. “You’re the best, Kravitz. I’m really sorry I can’t be more. I would if I could, you know, but…”

 

“But you have a wife and child. I understand.”

 

“Yeah.” Travis sighed and hummed to distract himself. “Teresa, is her name. She’s really great. So sweet. Really great style-- you would appreciate it, I bet. I’m sure you’ll get to meet her sometime. Hopefully not soon, though. I think you would probably get along.”

 

Kravitz nodded, watching Travis, who smiled brightly to show he was for once  _ not  _ on the verge of bursting into tears while discussing his family.

 

“And my daughter, Bebe,” he went on. “Well, Barbara. She’s going to be such a handful when she gets a little older. I’m hoping my family can help Teresa out. Bebe’s already a little  _ too _ good at getting her way, you know?”

 

“Travis. Why are you telling me this?”

 

Travis raised his arms out to his sides, palms facing up and out. “Because I think you’re trying to give me your heart, and I can’t give you mine, and I want you to know why. Because you’re great and you deserve every good thing and… and these are the best parts of me. 

 

“Because I’m not-- because-- because this, this body, and this consciousness, that you think of as  _ me _ \-- it’s not the whole story. They’re a part of me, Kravitz. All of them. Teresa, and Bebe, and my brothers, and my dad and my whole family. And you’ve been really kind to me, and I want you to know that it’s a kindness to them, as well. Not to their memory, because it’s  _ me _ that’s dead and not them, but I guess… 

 

“I guess what I’m trying to say is,  I’m just a really lucky collection of people who have loved me. People who have made me better. And I know-- I know that you care about me, in some kind of way, and I care about you too, and I wish that  _ they _ could know you and know how good you are, but the best I can do is tell you about them. So that you  _ know _ , at least. 

 

Because you’re a part of me now, too. Your kindness, your… friendship. I want you to know how much I appreciate that.

 

“So, anyway,” Travis finished, feeling suddenly very self-conscious, “that’s-- that’s my heart! That’s me trying to say thank you, I guess.”

 

“You’re very welcome,” Kravitz said gently. “Thank you for telling me this. Your family, I… I will make sure they are taken good care of, when I meet them.” Travis nodded. 

 

“Probably not for a really long time, though,” he added quickly, making Travis smile.

 

“Would it be okay if I hugged you again, Travis?”

 

“Uh,  _ duh _ ,” Travis said, and opened his arms wide.

 

When they separated, Travis said, “Hey, Krav. Question for you.”

 

“A question, for me?” Kravitz deadpanned. “How am I not surprised.”

 

“Why do you smell so much like cinnamon?”

 

Kravitz paused, and then laughed. Travis was glad to hear the sound. “I guess it’s probably the bear claws  Pálma baked for Barry and sent with me.” He gestured to the bag slung over his shoulder. “She always uses extra cinnamon. It’s something of a specialty in the city where I grew up.”   
  
“Well, that sounds  _ delicious _ ,” Travis said, “But that’s not what I meant. Your house smells like cinnamon too. It’s on your clothes. And something else, kind of-- woody, maybe? Like trees, or sap?”

 

“Oh,” Kravitz said. The light had gone from his voice. “Well,  _ that _ is probably just from the offering smoke. It tends to follow me. People burn all sorts of things and dedicate them to me in a bid to buy themselves more time.”

 

“Really?”   
  


“Between that and the funeral pyres, the cinnamon smell is pretty common. The rest is probably just copal, or incense.”

 

“Gotcha,” Travis said. The mention of funeral pyres sent his imagination to places he wasn’t quite willing to go. Death was still a bit of a sore subject for him, after all.

 

“So those bear claws,” he said, changing the subject. “Are there enough for me to sneak a few without Barry noticing?”

 

Kravitz laughed and stroked Buttercup’s head where she was butting into his leg, retrieving the bony hand from her mouth and re-affixing it to his arm, wiggling his fingers as he clad it in flesh once more. “You’ll have to wait, I’m afraid. The real issue is sneaking them without Pálma noticing. She has ways of knowing when she’s disobeyed.”   
  
“I bet  _ that _ was fun to grow up with.”   
  
Kravitz gave him a sidelong look and resumed walking. “You don’t even  _ know _ ,” he said. Under his breath, Travis heard him add, despairingly, “ _ Witches. _ ”

 

Travis hurried to catch up with him and the three of them walked on in silence for awhile as Travis turned a few things over in his mind. Something was bothering him; something he had been meaning to ask.

 

“Kravitz,” he said thoughtfully. “Paloma is like me, isn’t she?”   
  
Kravitz nearly tripped mid-stride but recovered gracefully and kept on, slightly faster than before. “I don’t know what you mean,” he said, focused resolutely on the path ahead.

 

“She’s like me!” Travis insisted. “She’s also been to the place between places. And this isn’t your homeworld, but she’s your aunt, right?” Kravitz didn’t answer. “Kravitz, did you bring her back from the  dead?”

 

Finally Kravitz sighed, relenting. “In a manner of speaking, I suppose I did. She was my last living relative. She moved into our house after my mother died-- my father, Pálma’s brother, had died when I was a child. When she passed I found a temple to the Raven Queen and I pled my case.”

 

“Ah.” Travis said. “Is that how you got your job?”

 

Kravitz made a gesture somewhere between a nod and a shrug. “In a manner of speaking. I pledged myself in thrall to the Queen, and she allowed me to bring Pálma back if I would forfeit the remainder of my natural life.”

 

“She must have really taken a liking to you.”

 

Kravitz laughed, but there was no humor in it. “Yes, you could say that. I’m afraid she’s spent the last few hundred years holding on to the hope that I’ll change my mind about her.”

 

“That’s not how it works!” Travis said.

 

“You’re telling me.”

 

“So Paloma was like a-- signing bonus, I guess? Or what?”

 

“You could say that. Of course, we’d already had the funeral rites for her at home, so I couldn’t just restore her to her previous life. Morrigan helped me make arrangements with Istus for Pálma to set up shop near one of her temples on the Prime Material Plane of another dimension.”

 

“So she’s been there for quite awhile, huh?” 

 

Kravitz nodded. “Nearly three centuries, now.”

 

Travis whistled low. “Shit! Am I going to live forever, too?”

 

Kravitz smiled at him. “Selfishly,” he said, “I rather hope not.”

 

\--

 

Refuge was sleepy in the hours between the miners getting to work and the town going about its business. They went relatively unnoticed as they slipped through shadows and down alleys to reach the portal Kravitz had set up. Travis in his khaki gear (he was fairly certain now that the ensemble included jodhpurs) more or less blended in with the few townsfolk they saw, but Kravitz-- clad as ever in his signature black suit-- stood out like a blot of ink against the parchment-colored landscape. 

 

The buildings became denser toward the center of town and the humble clapboard houses gave way to old-fashioned flat facades fixed over squat brick structures. The one exception was a gleaming granite bank building, twice as tall as the storefronts around it, its pillars carved with scrollwork and gargoyles. 

 

Travis craned his neck as they approached, trying to get an eyeful of the architectural details despite the beating sun. Before he could position himself squarely in front of it for a full view, though, Kravitz beckoned him down a narrow alley along the side of the building. They crunched through the dust and sparse grass growing in the shadow of the bank and rounded its corner to reveal a comparatively plain back door. Travis could see the faint white outlines of illegible runes drawn around it. They reminded him of the strange language he’d seen on the gates to the Eternal Stockade when he’d first landed in the astral plane. He suppressed a shudder.

 

“Are you ready?” Kravitz asked. Travis was not much comforted to hear his own nervousness reflected in Kravitz’s voice. He nodded mutely, then burst out, “Oh  _ man _ , this is so weird. I know we’ve jumped through dimensions together before or whatever but I just can’t shake this-- this--”

 

“It feels different,” Kravitz cut him off. “I know.” He didn’t meet Travis’ eyes as he added, “Maybe because it’s the last time we’ll be traveling together.”

 

Travis reached out and silently took his hand.

 

Kravitz ran a dark tattooed finger along the frame of the door and, together, they stepped through.

 

They had not opened a tear in space-time as they had on previous trips; rather, the door itself seemed to turn insubstantial, and they passed through it as easily as walking through a fog. 

 

The scene on the other side was a riot of color, sound, smell, and light.

 

They had entered into the shadowed outskirts of a market square and brightly colored silk tents were set up everywhere, people shouting their wares and services, customers passing in the narrow spaces between the stalls. Above the red and gold and cobalt blue of the tents was a cloudless violet sky hung with twin suns.

 

“ _ Whoa _ ,” Travis breathed.

 

“Home.” Kravitz said.

 

From the other side of the door came a series of barks. They looked at each other as the last bark faded to a whine. Travis whistled and, after a moment’s hesitation, Buttercup launched herself through the portal. She barked again when she saw the two of them, circled their legs, sniffed them, sniffed the ground, stared distrustfully at the door she had just come through. She then shook herself off, the familiar equivalent of a doggy shrug, and Travis smiled to hear her new tag jingling against her collar. She sprang up, resting her two front legs on Travis’ thigh, and whined until he scooped her up.

 

“I told you I wouldn’t forget you again,” he muttered. Kravitz leaned over to pat her ears. She panted happily at him.

 

“Shall we?” Kravitz asked.

 

The market crowds were dense and everywhere was a strange new sight to behold and a new spice wafting on the wind, but Travis tried his best to keep up a steady jog in the wake of Kravitz’s long, confident stride.

 

People seemed to make way for him, almost unconsciously, and Travis wondered if they saw him the same way he did.  _ Maybe on the surface _ , he decided,  _ but by now I would be surprised if anyone knows as much of Death as I do. _

 

The market stalls grew fewer as they walked and with them the throngs of people thinned too. It was the most populous place they had been together and Travis tried not to stare at the folks they passed-- some of them with deep crimson skin and horns that curled away from all-black eyes, some of them slender and tall and ethereally beautiful, some of them having the top half of a bull or the bottom half of a horse. None of them seemed remotely as interested in him as he was in them.

 

Soon they arrived at a perfectly nondescript rowhouse, its door answered by a perfectly nondescript human man.

 

“Hi, Kravitz,” he said, and Kravitz inclined his head and smiled.

 

“Barry!” Travis laughed. He helped himself to a deep hug that Barry, apparently, was not expecting.

 

“Oh, wow, okay, alright,” Barry said as Travis released him. He adjusted his glasses. “Is that, uh… is that normal, where you’re from?”

 

“I wouldn’t count on it,” Kravitz said archly, and gestured: “May we come in?”   
  
“Oh, yeah, yeah, of course,” Barry said, “Where are my manners. Please, come on inside.” He opened the door wide for them and lead the way down a hallway toward the back of the house.   
  
“Shoes off, please!” He called behind him.   
  
Travis left his boots by the door and took his time in following, lingering on the decor in the hallway and the rooms beyond. He was reminded of a house museum he’d visited once, on a school trip; he guessed that it might have been Victorian but couldn’t remember for sure. 

 

Not that it would matter much on this plane, anyway.

 

Barry’s house was narrow, and the front door had opened onto a staircase on the right and a hallway down the center, acting as thoroughfare for the formal living room and dining room to the left. At the end of the hallway was the kitchen, painted a cheerful pale yellow. There he found Kravitz leaning against a counter, ankles crossed, while Barry rooted through a surprisingly modern-looking refrigerator.

 

“Do ya like, uh… sandwiches?” Barry asked him, peering over the door of the fridge.

 

“Sure do!” Travis said. He took a seat at the little bistro table against the back wall, feeling perfectly at ease despite his earlier fear.  _ This is okay _ , he thought.  _ This is familiar. It might even be… exciting? _

 

He wasn’t too sure about that last bit, but he was intrigued by what he had seen at the market, and he was relieved that Barry’s house seemed to hold neither fantastical design elements-- at least, he could see no mystical crystals dangling from the ceiling-- nor any particularly old-fashioned amenities. He could swear he had even seen a straight-up bathroom under the stairs as he passed.

  
“I suppose it’s moot to offer introductions,” Kravitz said. “But just for the sake of posterity: Barry, this is Travis McElroy, my… charge. Travis, this is Barry Bluejeans.”   



	10. INTERLUDE II: Adrift

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time passes. Kravitz retraces his steps. Barry extends himself. Buttercup gets scrappy. Travis goes to work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Friday, friends! So many wonderful comments this week-- I truly can't thank you enough <3 I'm so happy you're along for this wild ride! (Fair warning: there are some feels ahead). I'm so glad you're here and I hope you enjoy this long-ass chapter!

The first few days were the easiest. Kravitz hung around longer than he probably should have, given the increased scrutiny on the part of the Raven Queen, but he brushed off any apprehensions Barry or Travis voiced.

 

“It’s fine,” he would say. “It’s just a day.” (It’s just two days, it’s just a week). “Besides, who knows when I’ll get to see my boys again.” That’s what he had taken to calling them: his boys. He didn’t even sound embarrassed when he said it.

 

Travis was pleased to discover that he and Barry got along swimmingly. Barry was smarter than him, which he liked, and there was no end to the questions Travis peppered him with about the _how_ s and the _why_ s of the world they both now inhabited. Barry had originally studied as a biologist and so he harbored an astonishing amount of information about the ecosystems of the world and how they worked together; more importantly, Barry had always been a giant fucking nerd, so he held an almost unhealthy delight in educating Travis.

 

This plane was not nearly so medieval as Travis had feared, either. Society had developed advanced technology to rival earth’s and the magic that was native to the world had been studied, understood, and harnessed for the benefit of all. This was Travis’ favorite part: to walk into town and find, on any given street corner, some practitioner-- whether they be a potion-maker, a master of enchantments, or a fortune-telling witch like Paloma-- and watch them make light take shape, to watch shapes transform in front of him, to see one piece of matter transmuted into another.

 

Barry and Kravitz had laughed at him, initially, but Barry found value in his childlike curiosity of magic and its mechanics, and took to structuring lessons around Travis’ latest inquiries. He told Travis that his questions, naive as they were, helped him to see the world more impartially and thus enriched his studies.

 

He went so far as to show Travis a few basics of evocation and illusion, but Travis could never _produce_ any magic of his own. That was alright with him, though. It was more than he had ever expected just to see it in action. He reveled in the brave new world he had stumbled on, and the friends that had unexpectedly come with it.

 

As silly as it was, Travis felt that he had acclimated much more quickly upon receiving a gift from Kravitz: a small wardrobe of clothing suited to his new home, hidden in the shoulder bag Kravitz had carried after retrieving Buttercup from the astral plane and meeting Travis and Paloma once again in Refuge. True, he’d also stashed Barry’s bear claw pastries in there for the trip over, but the only real effect of that was a lasting cinnamon scent that the clothes never quite lost. Travis didn’t mind; it made him think of Kravitz, his cozy home, and their important and all-too-short acquaintance.

 

At the very bottom of the bag, Travis had found the slate-blue suit he’d worn in future Los Angeles. He held it up to his face, inhaling the smell, remembering how he had told Kravitz it was his favorite of the outfits the rift had gifted him. When he finally came out from his room later that first afternoon, Barry had had the good grace to pretend he hadn’t heard Travis’ sentimental tears.

 

It felt far too soon, of course, when Kravitz told them over breakfast one morning that Travis was taking to his new environs better than he could have hoped and that he had spent too long away from his duties. It was time for him to go back to the astral plane, he said, and leave them to shape their own fates.

 

Neither Travis nor Barry had missed the nights where Kravitz was mysteriously absent, nor the mornings where he appeared in the kitchen ashen-faced and haggard, obviously sleep-deprived, just as they sat down for coffee. They politely pretended that Kravitz’s increased paranoia was perfectly natural and the glances he constantly shot over his shoulders were nothing more than practical.

 

His needing to return full-time did not exactly come as a shock.

 

It was clear to all of them that he had lingered too long, not that any of them would say it out loud; it felt too much like tempting fate.

 

So on the morning of his pronouncement, Travis met Barry’s eyes over the lip of his mug, and schooled his own face to match Barry’s expression of neutral indifference.

 

“That makes sense,” Travis said. “Of course.”

 

Kravitz met his gaze and held it for a long moment. Buttercup, sensing the tension in the room, lifted her head from her new bowl and trotted over to rest it in Kravitz’s lap instead.

 

It was easier for Travis to look at her than at Kravitz, so he did. “Hey,” he said, brightening, “The mirror tag will still work, right? We can still call you?”

 

Kravitz watched him a moment longer before answering. “Theoretically, yes,” he said. “That should work just fine. If you… if you all want to get in touch.”

 

His face did not reflect Travis’ relieved smile.

 

\--

 

Kravitz chose to make his exit late that night, after he’d checked that both his human boys were sound asleep: Travis, sprawled out and snoring on the old down mattress in the guest room off of Barry’s kitchen which, to date, had only ever been occupied by Kravitz himself; and Barry, slumped over the eternal piles of notes which always littered his desk, glasses askew and lightly drooling. Kravitz had taken the horn-rimmed frames off of his face ( _Why he won’t just let me fix his eyes for him, I’ll never know,_ he thought) and folded them neatly on the desk above Barry’s head. He stroked Barry’s unruly brown hair, reflecting on how little Barry now resembled the child he first came to care for, and padded downstairs to peer in at Travis one more time before he left. And if he lingered a moment too long in the doorway, he thought, at least there was no one there to judge him for it.

 

They _were_ his boys, and he loved them, for better or worse. Differently, of course. But he would miss them both terribly. He could not quite bring himself to say out loud that he had no plans to cross their paths on this plane again. He wondered if they felt it. He could not quite decide whether he hoped they didn’t, so they could remain oblivious, or whether he hoped they _did_ , so that they could miss him too.

 

It didn’t matter, either way. He had ache enough in his heart to go around.

 

Only Buttercup was still awake in the little house as he made his silent goodbyes and he found her attempting her best impression of a guard dog at the back door. She growled softly as she saw him approach, fur tipped silver in the moonlight, but her ever-wagging tail gave her away. He knelt and she went to him immediately, nudging his face and licking his nose urgently.

 

“I know, baby,” he said. “I’m sorry. I’m gonna miss you too.”

  
  
He stood again and she balanced on her haunches, paws in the air. He laughed softly.

  
  
“You be good,” he told her. “Watch out for your dad. Keep him safe for me, okay?”

  
  
Buttercup cocked her head and dropped to all paws again, trotting around him and pausing at the door to Travis’ room. “It’s okay,” he told her. “Go on.” 

  
She plodded softly into the room and hopped onto the bed, laying her head down on her paws to watch Kravitz. Travis stirred but didn’t wake. He reached a hand out in the dark and seemed to be satisfied when he was met with Buttercup’s fur, and fell back to peaceful slumber. Kravitz forced himself to see the glint of the silver ring on Travis’ left hand in the faint light from the window. He forced himself to remember this moment, etch it in his memory, to treasure what few elements of the scene he could call his own.

 

_Friends._ That is what Travis had said they were. That is what he wanted.   
  
_Friends_ , Kravitz thought. _Or nothing at all._

 

Kravitz had decided that the portal he’d constructed a fortnight ago to deliver Travis here would be his best bet for slipping in between planes quietly. True, it lead to the dungeons of the Eternal Stockade in the astral plane, which would not exactly be his favorite path home, but it also minimized the risk of attracting the Raven Queen’s attention.

 

As he passed through the market square, nearly every stall was dark; there was just one, under a midnight-blue tent, where a lamp still burned. He recognized it immediately as the offices of the royal scribe and her apprentices. As he passed, he spared a nod for the young brown girl still working, sitting cross-legged atop the counter and writing with both hands to transcribe a scroll into two copies.

 

She met his eyes as he went by, and they each nodded; he had been seeing her there for years, and though she was easily ten, even fifteen years younger than Barry she had grown just as much as he had in the time since Kravitz had been visiting. Her amber eyes burned with a ferocity he had rarely seen. No matter how long he went between his visits he could never quite seem to forget her gaze.

 

She was the last face he would see in his homeworld, he decided. It would be easier just to let the door close behind him.

 

And as he stood on the other side of the portal, rubbing away the chalk-inscribed sigils that had allowed him passage and watching the doorway fade slowly back to stone, he felt that he had left his heart somewhere behind him in the night-dark rooms of Barry’s little house. He wiped his cheeks dry and was glad to be unseen, glad to be cloaked in darkness that felt heavy enough to sink into his bones.

 

Kravitz watched the wall until the last traces of his magic had bled away from it, and he watched it a little longer beyond that. Then, sighing-- an old, useless habit he still found oddly comfortable-- he snapped his fingers to summon an orb of dancing light and sent it ahead of him to illuminate the way up the stairs.

 

Walking the winding corridors of the Stockade, he was struck with how alien the place felt. It had been too long since he’d been tending his regular duties, he decided; after he got some rest, he would take up his patrols again.

 

But it was more than just his absence, he realized, that rendered the walls menacing and the shadows oppressive. This place was a prison built to stymie and restrain the spirit of any who passed its gates.

For the first time, Kravitz did not feel he was its controller. The vow he’d made centuries ago held him as tightly as any chain.

 

He was every bit as bound as the poor, damned souls he’d sold his life-- and death-- to shepherd.

 

\--

 

Travis woke to the light of the second sun cresting the horizon and Buttercup’s insistent whines. He sat up, groggy, reaching for his glasses instinctually before remembering he no longer needed them. He swung his legs to the floor, pulled on the worn pair of jeans he’d come to accept as his favorite and most comfortable gear, and stretched broadly before bringing Buttercup out the backdoor and into the cramped garden beyond.

 

He stood muzzy and yawning, watching the trees rustle in the morning breeze while Buttercup made it her business to mark her favorites among them.

 

Behind him, he heard the back door close, and he found Barry leaning against the railing.

 

“Morning,” Travis said. It was impressively articulate, he thought, given the hour.

 

Barry nodded in response. His eyes were a little distant.

 

After a moment, he spoke: “Your tattoos. Are they some mark of servitude from your world?” He frequently titled comments in this way, as if he was briefing a class on the topic of their lecture.  
  
“Huh? Oh,” Travis said, looking down at all his various ink as though he was seeing it for the first time. He tended to forget it was there, really. “No, huh-uh. Not at all. I chose them.”   
  
Barry nodded but his brow remained furrowed. “Didn’t it hurt?”

 

“Well, yeah. But it was worth it. They’re fun!”  
  
“Kravitz’s are binding runes,” Barry dropped casually. He took a sip from his coffee mug. “Old magic. Blood magic.”   
  
Travis didn’t know what to say in response so he stood watching him, mouth slightly open, til he realized he probably looked ridiculous and shut it once again.

 

“He’s gone,” Barry said, tone still casual. He wasn’t looking at Travis anymore.

 

“Oh,” Travis said. “To check on the astral plane?” He whistled to Buttercup and she reluctantly quit her chase of a large, extravagantly plumed bird on the other side of the fence and heeled to him.

 

“No,” Barry said. “Gone.” He turned and went inside.

 

It took Travis a moment to process his words-- it was still _very_ early-- but as soon as he grasped their meaning he charged inside with Buttercup close behind.

 

“Wait, what?” he shouted to the empty kitchen. “Barry! What did you say?”

 

He got no response but the front door closing. Barry had set out silently for the Academy as he would every morning for the next several weeks, intent on throwing himself into his work, escaping from the pain of a parting made without a proper goodbye. Travis had no such distraction.

 

The first few days had been the easiest. But everything that followed was much, much harder.

 

\--

 

Time wore on in a blur, the astral plane phasing from dreary days to starless nights, and Kravitz tried to focus on bringing the deceased to rights and keeping the halls of his Stockade in order. People died, and spirits tried to slip away, and he brought them to justice and occasionally had to usher the more persistent shades into gentle understanding of what came next.

  
He tried to distance himself from the process, imagining that he was looking down on the scene from above whenever he had to check a person’s deeds in the Eternal Tome and haul them into a dark stone cell or lead them carefully into the rainbow waves. He tried not to think of them in terms of who they had been, or what they had meant to those they had left behind; he focused on his work, the here and now, and the days slipped on nearly the same as they always had.

 

At night, though, Kravitz found himself restless. Where before he would have taken up his time with reading, or creating something practical he could hold in his hands, he had found that-- to his surprise-- the only thing that now held his attention was practicing on the violin he’d kept in a locked closet of his library.

 

It had been his mother’s. On the day he had given up his life and all the dreams he’d once had in order to become a bounty hunter, he had shut the instrument away. For years, the very thought of it made the hollow of what had been his heart turn cold; then, gradually, it became a memory, eventually worn soft and almost pleasant through deliberate and careful handling.

 

Kravitz had not allowed himself to think of his one-time aspiration of becoming a musician for many years. What was the point? He’d wanted to someday conduct an orchestra. Now his only hopes of conducting came in the darkly comedic prospect of uniting the moans of the Stockade prisoners into harmony.

 

Nonetheless, he learned again the once-familiar violin and, nonetheless, he practiced dutifully. Dirges, mostly, at least at first. But remembering one song seemed to unlock the next and before he realized it he was recalling whole ballads from his homeland. True, they were rendered elegiac by their maestro, but he didn’t mind. He allowed himself to remember that this had once been the only thing he felt he was truly good at. Ballads became lays became his own experimental compositions.

 

Before long, Kravitz found that he had begun to compose a full suite, though he could not bring himself to title it. At the heart of every measure and each motif was the bittersweet memory of a connection ended too soon. The melodies sang with confusion and determination, hope and loss; the movements spoke of open hearts and closed doors, threads that had been broken being woven back into a new and richer tapestry.

 

Finally, it was complete. The songs stood alone. Together, they comprised a cycle that seemed to resonate beyond his own strange half-life, to tap into something older and larger that ran through the world and above it. He found, to his surprise, that he loved the music he had made. He found himself humming as he went about his work, taking comfort in the memories he had condensed into creation.

 

For the first time he could recall Kravitz felt he had truly accomplished something. He went from practicing and perfecting the suite to transcribing it, excitement at producing a measurable creation pushing him to stay up nights in a fever dream of charcoal and notation and page after page of newly-born music.

 

After weeks of work the project was nearly finished. He had just come to the last page of the last song when he stopped. Doubt filled him. _Was this how it was meant to end?_

 

Suddenly, he was hyper-aware of himself, as though he was somehow out of his body and watching the scene from above.

 

Who was this sad man, he thought, writing a symphony for one lonely instrument-- writing music that would be seen by none and heard only by the dead?

 

Who was this man, penning lamentations and calling them a love story?

 

He couldn’t imagine what world would want such noise.

 

He gathered up the papers he had been working on and fed them, one by one, into the fire.

 

_Friends,_ he thought, _or nothing at all._

 

_\--_

 

Travis was shocked when Barry nudged his bedroom door open one morning bearing a tray burdened with a small frosted cake, not least because Barry was a notably dreadful chef.

 

“Two years on,” Barry said. “How does it feel?”

  
  
Travis let his head fall back on the pillow. Had it really been so long? What did he have to show for it?

 

After Kravitz’s departure he and Barry had fallen into a sort of routine: Barry would leave early in the morning, bound for his offices at the academy, and hide beneath a mountain of self-created work until both suns had set and he could sidle home and slip upstairs without dinner; Travis, for his part, would sleep as late as Buttercup would allow and then spend the day walking in aimless circles among some neighborhood or another until they all began to feel familiar.

 

Then the first winter came, and Travis was forced to admit that the clothes Kravitz had given him-- while comfortable and suitably stylish-- were not nearly warm enough for the changing weather. He would need to buy a coat of some variety. This lead to an awkward conversation with Barry in which he had to ask, as humbly as he could, how exactly money worked in this world.

 

Luckily, the means of earning livelihood were not too altogether different from what they had been on earth, and so Travis began to visit shops he’d discovered previously to offer his help. He lingered at a bakery, but was passed up in favor of the baker’s son; he had designs on a bookstore, which unfortunately was staffed by a solitary old gnome who insisted he needed no help whatsoever.

 

Barry was nothing but encouraging in this new venture. Travis could tell he was working to dissolve the walls he had put up in the wake of Kravitz’s departure, hurt every bit as much as Travis had been by Death’s lack of ceremony. With his support and endorsement, Travis began to contract with the Academy for a variety of jobs ranging from administration to maintenance.

 

It was only in the past few months that he had been hired on in an official, full-time capacity to oversee an expansion project for the campus.

 

He was happy for this new development, as he and Barry now commuted the short walk together each morning and worked close enough that he could stop by at noon to remind Barry to eat lunch. Buttercup got to accompany him sometimes too, which _she_ loved; dogs were less common in this world and she was uniquely small among them, and the students and staff he worked with were always delighted when she trotted through the office door behind him carrying her scruffy tail as proudly as any knight would bear his standard.

 

More than that, though, it brought him closer to what he had come to accept as his purpose on this plane.

 

He made and maintained connections everywhere he could within the academy, massaging relationships with every Dean and Archmage he met to push them towards formalizing their mission to expand beyond education and theory, and into practical application.

 

No one had yet experimented with interplanar travel, he argued (fingers crossed discreetly in the folds of his tunic). Why shouldn’t they be the first?

 

And so day by day, week by week, he pushed the Academy to consider itself an institute not only for research, but for planar exploration.

 

And somehow time had slipped away quickly and quietly enough that today-- with the doubly-bright golden light streaming through his window and the air just beginning to cool toward autumn-- was apparently two years since his arrival. Realizing he had neglected to mark the passage of his time since leaving home made his cheeks warm and his heart heavy.

 

“Thanks for the cake, Barry,” he said. “I get to eat it for breakfast, right?”

  
  
Barry chuckled, backing out of the room to place his cake on the kitchen table. “Obviously.”

 

Travis got himself out of bed, combed his fingers through his beard-- grown rather long, now, that he no longer groomed it to accommodate Bebe’s grabbing fingers-- and swept his hair back. That had gotten long, too. He’d taken to wearing it wrapped into a knot at the back of his head. It was all very _Cast Away_ (which he felt was rather fitting).

 

Luckily fashion did not change very quickly here and the clothes he’d had upon arrival were still serviceable, if a bit worn. They fit looser now, too, thanks to a diet restricted by academic income. He had invested quite a few fantasy coins into new belts.

 

Some things did not change at all, though. Even though his hair grew longer it never greyed; no new lines appeared around his eyes. Buttercup, too, was exactly as sprightly as she had been when they’d arrived. He wondered if either of them would ever age again.

 

He made his way out to the kitchen in time to greet Buttercup as she emerged through the flap he’d installed in the back door for her. She got a little too close to his breakfast cake and he whistled for her to come away as he poured coffee. He felt like he was moving slowly today, burdened by the weight of his time in this world and how little he felt he had to show for it.

 

“Hey B-Jeans,” he called down the hallway, “You go on ahead without me. I think I’m going to take the morning off.”

 

“If you’re sure,” Barry called back. “But hey, bring me some of that cake for lunch, would ya?”

 

Travis smiled a little and cut himself a piece. The cake seemed to deflate when the surface tension of the frosting was broken, and attempting to pull his wedge free resulted in the cake’s immediate collapse into a landslide of gooey crumbs. He shook his head. Barry was still a terrible cook. _Some things don’t change at all._

 

He waited until he heard the front door slam behind Barry and then took the whole plate out back and slid it unceremoniously over their fence. He couldn’t help but think that the sight of the cake, intended for celebration and now puddled amongst the leaves and dirt, felt a little bit like a metaphor.

 

Travis took his time walking to work, taking a long circuitous route that would lead past his favorite bakery on the edges of their neighborhood. He had a vague idea of replacing Barry’s disaster cake with one he knew would at least be edible. Besides, it was quieter out here, away from the main streets, and pleasantly sparse in the dry late summer. It gave him an excuse to lose himself in quiet contemplation. Buttercup didn’t seem to mind as she dashed away up the road ahead, happy to have the time for extra play.

 

As he walked, he tried to count backward, to make sense of the last two years that had slipped past.

 

He had gotten so bad at keeping track of time. He moved from one new project to the next, at first searching for what felt like the best foothold toward what he knew to be the outcome he needed, then losing momentum and pushing just to keep afloat.

 

It had taken him months to stop waking up and wondering what recording the day had in store, months to stop arriving at the week’s end anticipating a conference call with his brothers to be broadcast to countless strangers.

 

It was much more surreal to suppress the anticipation of the next Adventure Zone recording, to idly wonder what race or class he should play next, only to be stirred out of his speculation by seeing an actual tiefling or halfling or dragonborn cross his path.

 

For so long he had segmented his time based on what they could create and release together. Missing it now was like having the black ink outline of an illustration removed, leaving only a wash of colors and indefinable shapes to navigate.

 

It wasn’t just the schedule, though, it was the _emptiness_ of the time that passed without those connections. He missed his brothers keenly; he’d never been without someone to meet his jokes with their intended punchlines, or understand his references, or polish up a silly bit he’d improvised until it actually shone with some kind of comedy. He had never realized before how deeply they’d shaped him. He’d never thought before that he might one day have to hold a joke or story indefinitely without hope of sharing it with them.

 

Was that what he had been doing all along, he wondered, when he made jokes-- reaching out in the darkness of experiences to see who else was reaching, to meet some stranger whose fingers he would be met with, who else had been there, who else would understand? Was the need to laugh at himself just some kind of armor? Or had it been a lifeline?

 

It wasn’t just his brothers, either. It was the whole network of friends and colleagues and collaborators they had amassed together over the years-- all the listeners who would catch his eye in public to shoot inconspicuous grins and thumbs-up, who would write in to say _thank you_ and _good point_ and _actually, have you considered this?_ , who would retweet him and affirm and build on everything he felt. Who was he, without any of them?

 

How had he been so vain as to think, before this happened, that he was a capably independent person?

 

And at the heart of all that he’d lost, Teresa-- Bebe and Teresa, his beautiful girls. Teresa who took him from his hopeless, messy younger self and inspired him to be better. No matter the improvements he  made he never felt he had been good enough to be worthy of her. He had always believed in his heart of hearts that she deserved more. He let his mind slide down an uncomfortable, familiar line of thought: had she moved on? Had she found someone who made her feel not only loved but lucky-- the way he had always felt about her?

 

And how old was Bebe now, he mused, how _big_ . If time moved the same on both planes she must be preparing for kindergarten soon. He hoped she was close to her cousins. He hoped her uncles would tell her stories about her dad; he hoped they’d make him sound funnier than he was, that they’d build up a legend of him past his shortcomings so that she could feel proud that she was _his_ , even though their time together was far, far too short.

 

There was no way any story could overstate how much he cared for her, though. From the moment he’d known she was going to come into the world, he loved her ferociously; from the moment they finally got to meet, he was over the moon, in love, obsessed. Watching her grow was his greatest joy and privilege. If nothing else, he hoped that she would grow up surrounded by stories of her dad’s abiding love for her.

 

Every day and every night he wished there was some way he could see her, to hold her hand through the dark times, to watch out for her. Even if she never knew he was there.

 

He tried, sometimes, to call Kravitz-- at first for his friendship, but then increasingly to ask favors. _Please try to reach them for me. Please tell them I’m okay. Please tell them how much I love them, how much I miss them, how sorry I am._

 

Over time, he realized Kravitz could not or would not answer his calls. He was hurt by this, and confused, but eventually that hurt and confusion bled into all the rest of it, and he never could hold a grudge against his one-time friend for his disappearance. Travis felt it would be nothing short of hypocritical of him if he did. He knew a thing or two about disappearing acts, after all.

  
He did at least have Barry, who was a true friend if an enormous dork, and Buttercup, who was as faithful a dog-friend as he ever could have hoped for. The thought of her snapped him back to the present and out of his reverie, lifting his face into a smile, and as he finally emerged from the fog of his thoughts he called for her.

 

His brow furrowed when she didn’t heel. Normally she was so good at coming running whenever she heard her name. He called again, then whistled; still nothing. This was not like her at all.

 

Feeling the sharp teeth of worry gnaw into the edges of his brain, he picked his pace up into a jog. This part of the road was less familiar to him; he’d walked long enough, lost in thought, to deliver him out to the edge of the city and toward the farmlands beyond. When was the last time she had circled back to seem him? How long had it been?

 

He sped up again and rounded a corner into a clearing between two fields. There he saw, to his relief, Buttercup’s familiar shape. She was bent over something on the ground, sniffing it or licking-- he couldn’t tell-- but when she heard him call her name she wagged her tail and ran toward him.

 

Something was wrong. She was limping heavily, her breathing labored, and when she attempted her customary greeting of getting her face as close to his as possible he could see that it hurt her to jump up on her hind legs. He caught her front paws and lowered himself slowly into a kneel, taking her with him, examining her for any evidence of what had happened.

 

She allowed herself to be looked over and he found blood drying across her snout, as well as a spot on her side that made her cringe and whimper when he ran his hands over it. Someone had taken it upon themself to beat his dog. _What the fuck?!_ Anger seared through him.

 

“Who did this to you?” he asked her hoarsely. She pushed her nose into his neck and huffed as he patted her gently. He didn’t know if he wanted to rage and scream or cry.

 

“I’ll find ‘em,” he promised her. “Whoever did this, I’ll find ‘em.”

 

“I think they went that way,” piped a reedy voice. Travis, surprised, whipped his head around to locate its source.

 

What he had taken to be a pile of rags on the ground was shifting now, and Travis could see what had held Buttercup’s interest-- not a heap of refuse, as he had initially guessed, but a boy. By the looks of it, he too had been badly beaten.

 

Travis dropped Buttercup’s paws and rushed to help the kid into a sitting position. “What happened?” Travis asked him.

 

The kid seemed dazed, his eyes fluttering and drooping as he struggled to focus on Travis’ face. “Is that your dog?” he asked in reply.

 

“Yeah, that’s-- that’s Buttercup. She’s mine. What _happened_?”

  
  
“Thought she was a stray,” the boy said, closing his eyes. “Saw some shitheads kicking her. Tried to stop ‘em.”

  
  
“Did they do this to you?” Travis asked. Buttercup had labored her way over and now lay down beside the injured boy, placing her head in his lap. The kid nodded.

  
  
Something about this was so familiar, Travis thought. He couldn’t place it. No one had ever tried to fuck with his dog before. He’d never seen this kid in his life. Unless.... _Unless._

 

He peered closer at the face of Buttercup’s savior. He was probably only about eleven or so, certainly not yet a teenager, but under the dust caked on his face and his mop of unruly auburn hair were wispy attempts at prepubescent sideburns. He was scrawny-- no, _gangly_ , his shoulders broad in spite of his skinny arms. His breathing was evening out and he rested a hand gently, carefully, on Buttercup’s head. She reached up to lick his wrist adoringly.

 

Travis’ breath caught.

  
  
“ _Magnus_?”


	11. Chapter Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Magnus isn't convinced. Barry must process some new information. Buttercup asks for pets (and mostly receives). Travis makes some tough calls and, also, a large quantity of pasta.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Five days late is better than not at all, right?? Well, I hope so. Here's another doozy for you! Just ONE more regular chapter before the epilogue (I'll tell you now-- chapter ten is gonna be a honker).
> 
> On a more serious note: this chapter contains discussion of depression and suicidal ideation. Please do not read if you feel it would be damaging for your mental wellbeing! I love you and want you to be safe. <3

“How do you know my name?” The kid asked him. He sounded suspicious, but not alarmed, which Travis took to be a good thing. Still, that could just be the fault of his injuries.

  
  
_ Slow and steady _ , Travis thought.  _ No rushing in.  _ He felt his mouth quirk into a grin. It was just so exciting to see Magnus, at last, and he felt like a proud parent knowing that this person who he thought he had invented actually lived and breathed in the world. Well,  _ a  _ world.

 

Of course, he had always pictured Magnus a little beefier than the ungainly scrap in front of him, but-- Travis did some quick math in his head-- it was probably still eight years or so until he’d be hired on as Security for the Starblaster and its mission.

 

“So you are Magnus, then?” Travis asked him. “Magnus Burnsides?”   


  
“Dude, what the fuck!” Magnus said.   


  
“Hey! Language!”   


  
“ _ Language _ , are you kidding me? How do you know my name?”   


  
_ So much for going slow and steady _ , Travis thought. _ Can’t exactly tell him I made him up _ .

 

Instead, he settled for saying, “Your, uh… your dad told me.”   


  
“My dad’s dead,” Magnus said flatly. He eyed Travis with suspicion. “Who  _ are  _ you?”

 

This was more complicated than Travis had expected. Every possible answer seemed like it would only introduce a new minefield of anomalies to explain.

 

“My name’s Travis,” he said, deciding it would be best to keep it simple. “I work at the Academy. This is my dog, Buttercup.”   


  
“Hi, Buttercup,” Magnus said to her, leaning down to look in her face as he scratched the top of her head. He whispered to her, almost too quiet for Travis to hear, “Sorry about those dummies giving you a hard time. I threw a rock back, I promise.” She panted happily, receiving his affection with rapturously smiling eyes and lolling tongue.

 

“It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Travis. And you, Buttercup.” He raised his eyes and grinned crookedly. “I like dogs.”   


  
“Me too,” Travis said, feeling himself smile in return. He wanted so badly for this kid to like him, to trust him, but his brain was buzzing with all the new ways this could become confusing.

 

“Tell you what,” Travis said, “Me and Buttercup were on our way to the bakery. I was going to pick up a cake to share with my friend at lunchtime. Do you want to come with?”   


  
Magnus’ eyes lit up. “A cake? Hell yeah!”   


  
“ _ Language _ ,” Travis chided him. Magnus rolled his eyes.

 

“Whatever, I’m almost twelve. No one cares if I say ‘hell’ or whatever.”

 

“Well,  _ I  _ care,” Travis insisted, dusting off his trousers as he stood up and extended a hand to Magnus.

 

“Okay, grandpa, sorry if you care, but like,  _ nobody else  _ does.”   


  
“I am not nearly old enough to be your grandfather.”   


  
“Whatever, dude! You look old.”   


  
“I’m not old! I’m 37.”   


  
“Oh shit! Sorry. You’re not old, you’re  _ ancient _ .”   


  
“ _ Language _ ,” Travis repeated hopelessly as Magnus guffawed and charged ahead, Buttercup tagging along at his ankles.

 

\--

 

At the bakery, Magnus chose a cake with an elaborate coiffure of frosting on top, and Travis scraped together enough copper from the depths of his coin purse to bring it with them.

 

At the Academy, Magnus nearly dropped the precious cargo when they entered the hall housing Barry’s offices.

 

“ _ Whoaaa _ ,” he breathed. “Do you seriously work here?”   


  
“Well, technically, this is my friend Barry’s building. But I work over there.” Travis paused on the grand esplanade that separated the Academy’s Great Hall from the rest of the campus and turned to point behind him. Magnus copied his motion, scanning the distance. “The big rock one?” he asked.

 

Travis stepped behind him and nudged his shoulder a little to the right to redirect his gaze. “Not quite,” he said, “That one.”   


  
“But that’s just a big hole in the ground!”

 

“Exactly. But in a year or so, the construction on it will be finished, and then it will be a big shiny new building. Come on, let’s go in.”   


  
Magnus jogged to catch up. “Will the new building be as cool as this one?”   


  
“Way cooler,” Travis promised. Magnus squinted at him. “I don’t know if I believe you.”   


  
“Trust me,” Travis said. “It will be like this--” he gestured at the hall they had just entered, its tall arched ceilings and dark wood-paneled walls, the inset stonework around the windows and the bas relief carvings at the joists, “-- except newer, and a little bigger, and a ton more gadgets that will help us learn stuff. New stuff that no one’s ever known before.”

 

“That’s pretty cool, I guess,” Magnus conceded. He was gawking at the ceiling now, with its crescent-shaped crystal skylights punctuating ancient frescoes. Travis shepherded him into the sitting room adjacent to Barry’s offices where they each settled into one of the leather armchairs that populated the little lobby. It was pleasant in here, too-- a little dimmer without the skylights, but warmed by the glow of small enchanted sconces along the walls and made homey by the end tables and stacks of books next to every chair. It was not nearly so grand as the main entrance hall but Magnus’ eyes were wide as he took in the furnishings here, too.

 

“I think this might be the zhuzhiest place I’ve ever been,” Magnus said. Travis laughed. “The  _ what _ ?”   


  
“Zhuzhy,” Magnus said. “You know, fancy?”

 

“I know what it means, I’m just surprised you do! You’ve got quite the vocabulary for a kid your age.”   


  
“Yeah, think of all the curse words I know!”

 

Travis shot him a warning look.

 

“But seriously,” Magnus went on. “This place is so cool. Hey! If your new building is going to be like this too can I come see it when it’s done? What exactly makes it your building, anyway?”   


  
“Uh,” Travis said. “It’s not really  _ my _ building, per se, but I’m the one overseeing the whole process.” He studiously avoided the first question; how much contact with Magnus would be  _ too  _ much in the years ahead? Despite his excitement at their meeting, he had an uneasy feeling growing in his stomach.

 

“Overseeing it? Does that mean you’re like… like some kind of carpenter, or what?”

 

“Sure,” Travis said, distracted. It wasn’t exactly a lie; he’d worked as master carpenter on enough shows and sets in his old life that his response was nearly automatic. He could not bring himself to launch into an explanation of the truly mundane minutiae of his job description, especially as one increasingly urgent question dogged his consciousness:

 

_ What do I do now? _

 

It was one thing to know Barry Bluejeans and to work with him despite having been first introduced to him as a work of fiction. Barry, with his sparse bachelor’s house, his terrible cooking, and his obsessive study of the planes-- his sheer willingness to believe in the world Travis came from as well as his willingness to guide Travis through this one-- Barry was open in both heart and mind. He was discreet in managing the secret of Travis’ true origin (probably, Travis had long ago decided, because he kept so many secrets of his own). He was his own person, already fully formed and intent on his path.

 

But Magnus? Magnus was Travis’ own creation. Travis had poured so much of himself into this idea of a tank, a fighter, a protector, a musclebound dummy with a heart of gold. And now a younger and very real version of that same character was sitting on an overstuffed lobby chair in front of him, legs swinging idly, looking scruffy and scrappy and out of place among the dusty grandeur of the Academy.

 

“ _ I _ wanna build stuff when I grow up,” Magnus declared. “Like houses and stuff, I think. I mean… I don’t know.” He looked at his hands and his expression turned a little wistful. “I’m really clumsy. My mom says I blunder around like a firbolg in an enchanter shop. I break a lot of stuff.” 

 

His mouth twisted to one side. He spread his fingers out, splaying his hands on his legs. “My dad was big, too. At least my mom says so. He didn’t make stuff, though. He just hauled things for people.”   


  
“What kind of things?” Travis asked, absolutely fascinated by this early inner life of someone he would have once said he knew everything about.

 

Magnus shrugged. “I don’t know, stuff from the docks. He’d hop on the ships when they got into the harbor here and help ‘em get all their shi-- I mean, their crap-- over to the market square to sell.”   


  
“When did you lose him?” Travis asked, gently, all too aware of how tough it was to talk about a missing parent.

 

Magnus studied the floor. “I was like three, I think. I don’t really remember much about him. It’s just me and my mom now.” He took a deep breath, let it slowly. 

 

Travis reached over and squeezed his shoulder. “I bet your dad would be  _ super  _ proud of you.”

 

“Huh? For what?”

 

“Oh. Um.” Travis tried to untangle his own internal conversations with the one unfolding in real time with Magnus.  _ He doesn’t know you _ , he reminded himself. “For, uh-- for saving Buttercup! That was really brave of you. You did a good thing. I’m sure your dad would be proud.”   


  
Magnus’ eyes sparkled as he met Travis’ gaze. “You think?”   


  
“I know it,” Travis said, feeling a tightness in his throat. 

 

He was saved from further fraught topics by the creaking of a heavy carved oak door. Barry strode out from his cluttered office looking mussed but cheerful. “Sorry to keep you waiting, Trav, I--”

 

“Hi!” Magnus said, hopping up and sticking out his hand before Travis could even move to introduce him. “I’m Magnus Burnsides! You’re old like Mr. Travis so are you the guy we’ve been waiting for?”

 

Barry, caught entirely off-guard, responded to Magnus with a firm if slightly dazed handshake. He turned wide eyes to Travis.

 

“Is this… yours?”   


  
Travis laughed. “Barry, this is my new friend Magnus. He protected Buttercup from some jerks who were trying to beat her up, so I told him he could share some cake with us. Magnus, this is my friend Barry. He’s the smartest guy you’ll ever meet.”   


  
“How do you do, young friend,” Barry said carefully. His overly formal bearing belied the fact that he clearly was not used to addressing children of this age. “What’s that you’ve got there?”

 

“Oh, this is a cake!” Magnus said excitedly as he swept the bakery box off of the side table by his chair and presented it to Barry with both hands. “Mr. Travis said you gave him a really gross one so we went and replaced it with this one! I think it will probably be much better!”

 

“Thanks, bud,” Travis muttered, as Barry turned baleful eyes his way.

 

\--

 

After a frankly ill-advised lunch consisting entirely of cake, Barry stopped by one of the drink carts roaming the campus quad and bought them each a small clay bottle of cold tea, then bid them adieu and returned to his eternal stacks of studies and notes.

 

“What now?” Magnus said. “I liked today. Will you tell Mr. Barry thanks for me? For the tea?”

 

“Oh, no problem.”   
  
“No problem,” Magnus parroted. He grinned and tossed a stick he’d been swinging for Buttercup to fetch. “Mr. Barry’s funny. He’s kind of a nerd.”

 

“Well,  _ kind  _ of, but he’s also super cool!”

 

“I know!” Magnus protested. “I’m not saying he’s not cool! I liked him a lot. Do you think he’d teach me about the planes and stuff?”

 

“I’m sure he will. Someday.”

 

Magnus tugged his sleeve, an endearingly childlike gesture. “Hey, um, do you think we could hang out again? You could show me your building. Maybe I could help you build it! Mr. Magnus Burnsides, carpentry apprentice. What do you think? I could come back tomorrow!”

 

Magnus was chattering away so happily that he hadn’t even noticed when Travis stopped in his tracks. 

 

_ It’s now or never,  _ he told himself. His thoughts were spiraling away from him, countless possibilities unfolding and collapsing as he forced himself to the moment of decision.  _ Do I stay in his life? Or do I let life run its own course, and hope it all turns out like I’ve planned? _

 

He was convinced there could be no inbetween.

 

Buttercup, returning with stick in mouth, cocked her head at him but cantered past to catch up with Magnus.

 

“Hey,” Magnus said, turning, brow furrowing, “What’s up? I was saying I could come back to the Academy tomorrow--”

 

“ _ No _ ,” Travis snapped. It came out more forceful than he intended and Magnus flinched.

 

“Well, okay,” he said, relenting, “it doesn’t have to be tomorrow. But I don’t have to go back to school for real for like another three weeks and I really want to--”

 

“No,” Travis repeated. “I’m sorry, Magnus, that’s not going to work. Not tomorrow, not in a few weeks.”   
  
“I--” Magnus faltered. He looked confused, then crestfallen. After a pause, he muttered, “Yeah… okay.” and began to walk back towards the quad.

 

“Wait,” Travis said, suddenly doubting his resolve, “Where are you going?”

 

“Home,” Magnus called over his shoulder. His reedy pre-teen voice broke with emotion like an untuned violin. 

 

“Well, don’t go that way,” Travis said, jogging to keep up. “That’s gonna spit you right out into the canal district by the market, it’s not safe.”

 

“The canal district is where I live,” Magnus said. He didn’t turn to look at Travis as he fell into step beside him. The deadened, distrustful tone he’d used when he had first told Travis his dad was dead had returned. His youth-soft features suddenly seemed shadowy beneath the glare he leveled at the ground as he walked, scuffing his feet in the dust, and for the first time Travis could see the craggy, dangerous man he could one day become.

 

“Magnus--”

 

“I gotta get home, Mr. Travis. It was nice meeting you.”

 

“Wait,” Travis said. He stopped walking. Magnus didn’t. “Magnus, seriously, come on. Please just wait a second.”

 

Finally Magnus slowed his walk and turned to face him, fists on his hips. The anger with which he was trying to mask his disappointment was flimsy at best.

 

“ _ What _ , Mr. Travis?”

 

“I wanted to give you something.” Travis fumbled through his pockets until he found it-- a knife he’d picked up in one of his very first trips to the market with Barry. Ostensibly, it was for self-protection, but it was also very good for cutting fruit or whittling sticks in idle moments. He held it out to Magnus.

 

Magnus looked at the blade, then back to him. “I can’t take that,” he said.

 

“Why not?”

 

“It’s bad luck!”

 

“Uh… what?”

 

“Here, hold on.” And then it was Magnus’ turn to dig through his own pockets, turning them nearly inside out in the process, until he found a single copper coin. He thrust it toward Travis, bobbing it in the air when he didn’t immediately take it.

 

“I can’t accept your money, Magnus,” he said gently.

 

“But it’s bad luck,” Magnus repeated. He dropped the hand with the coin in it to his side. His expression fell. “You’re supposed to give someone payment for the gift of a knife, or anything sharp. Otherwise the connection between the giver and the new owner will be cut.”

 

Travis’ heart twisted. He drew in a long, slow breath and stepped forward to lay his hand on Magnus’ shoulder.

 

“I’m sorry, Magnus,” he said softly. Carefully. “I can’t accept your money.”

 

He took Magnus’ hands in his own and curled his small fingers around the handle of the knife.

 

“Be safe, okay?” he whispered. “Grow up tough. Protect anybody who needs it. Someday, when you’re old enough, maybe I’ll see you at the Academy.”

 

“Right,” Magnus said. “Sure.” His gaze was fixed on the knife in his hands. A single tear fell and wet the blade. Travis dropped his hands from his.

 

“Goodbye, Magnus.”

 

\--

 

“So what was up with that kid?” Barry asked him over their simple dinner of buttered noodles and beer that night. Travis had worked himself into a full-on thunderstorm of a mood after he’d finally arrived home, crackling with regret and doubt and distrust in his decision to cut off any further contact with Magnus. Something about the whole situation made him crave carbs. True, he probably hadn’t needed to make an entire eight-gallon cauldron of pasta, but its presence on the stove as he helped himself to a third bowl didn’t exactly bother him.

 

“Just some kid,” Travis grumbled through the steam. “Whatever.”

 

“Actually, uh-- sorry, Travis, this is suddenly not super comfortable for me to have to be saying, but definitely  _ not  _ whatever. It’s, um, it’s not exactly cool for grown-ass men to be hanging around kids all day.”

 

“Barry!”

 

“Hey, I don’t know!”

 

Travis sighed, shoving his pasta bowl away from him. Buttercup peeked beady eyes eagerly over the edge of the table. He ignored her. “You’re right. Definitely not whatever.”

 

“So?”

 

“Well…”  _ Where to begin?  _ Barry had listened to bits and pieces of his bizarre acquaintance with this world, most of which were relayed on the rare nights he let Travis drag him out to a tavern. Kravitz had filled him in on some of the more technical details back in the day, before Barry and Travis had ever even properly met, but Travis was wildly aware that there was much more Barry  _ didn’t _ know.

 

“Why don’t you grab some scratch paper,” he told Barry, “and a pen. No-- a pencil. And an eraser. You have one, right? I’ll try to explain it all.”

 

\--

 

It was full dark by the time Travis returned with a fresh flagon of ale to find Barry still puzzling over the crude flowchart of characters and creations he’d previously tried to flesh out.

 

“Making any more sense?” he called from the kitchen as he emptied the bottle into their steins.

 

“Not really,” Barry muttered in response. Travis handed him one mug and sat down in the armchair beside the sofa. He craned his neck to see which part Barry was stuck at.

 

“Oh,” he said, “Yeah, I could have been more clear there. ‘Dungeons and Dragons’ isn’t literal. It’s just the title of a game.”

 

“Sounds dreadful.”

 

“Actually, you’d probably like it. Well, I guess you kind of live it. By definition. But if there was a version for my world I bet you’d be into it.” He chuckled. “‘Offices and Bosses,’ I guess.”

 

“You’re rambling,” Barry said, still distracted.

 

“You’re right.”

 

Another pause, then Barry set the parchment down and sighed, pushing his glasses up his nose.

 

“It’s all very strange,” he said at last.

 

Travis could only nod.

 

“I think you made the right choice, though,” Barry said. His tone was growing more professorial. “Interfering with young Magnus. Or rather, not interfering with him. At least no further than you already did.”

 

“I’m glad you think so.” His words did little to soothe the disquiet Travis still grappled with. He tried to approach it intellectually. “It’s weird to know what he’ll become. Or, at least, to think that I know.”

 

They each fell quiet, lost in their own consideration.

 

“But, your purpose here--” Barry began, at the same moment Travis said, “But, there’s something--”

 

“Go ahead,” they said in unison.

 

“UGH,” Travis groaned. “I  _ hate  _ that trope.”

 

Barry cocked his head quizzically. Travis held up a finger. “ _ I  _ will go first, thank you! I was going to say: there’s something else I think I should probably explain.”

 

He retrieved the paper from Barry’s lap and flipped it over. He dug through the pencil pouch Barry had carried down from his office until he found a few colored pencils-- red, green, blue, yellow. Black.

 

He began to sketch.

 

\--

 

“Tell me again what you say we’ll start to call it,”  Barry said. His legs were now flung up over the back of the couch, the hems of his jeans sagging to his knees as his head hung down off the cushions towards the floor.

 

They were full drunk now, having long since broken out a dusty bottle of mead Barry had been saving since some birthday.

 

_ To the end of the world _ , they’d cheersed. Then, when they drained their cups, Travis poured them a second round and raised his glass. “To another end of another world,” he had said, only half-joking, and when Barry laughed and clinked the edges of their cups together he’d known that it was finally all falling into place.

 

They were still drinking after a half dozen iterations of this toast but the humor was quickly fading.

 

“Suddenly,” Barry had said, slurring but very solemn, “I find myself needing to know the plural of apocalypse.”

 

Then he threw up in the sink, apologized, poured another shot, and returned to the living room to pore once again over the parchment Travis had been working on.

 

It had been almost indecently therapeutic to finally come clean to Barry about his whole story, even the part where he’d had to describe the century Barry would have to spend reliving the same awful year dozens of different ways, but now Travis was just as eaten up with guilt over telling him as he was over shutting out Magnus.

 

His current game plan was to get Barry as blackout drunk as possible so he wouldn’t remember the details. So that he wouldn’t have to  _ know. _

 

So it was that in the present moment there was a Barry staring at him upside-down from the couch, legs bent to form the shape of a number four, arms akimbo across the cushions.

 

“What do we call it?” he asked, insistent, and hiccupped. “The-- the-- devourer? No. Wait. The…” he seemed to lose track of what he was saying. Instead, he hiccupped again, and continued to stare.

 

“You probably wouldn’t hiccup like that if you sat right side up, you know.”

 

“Don’t wanna.” Barry’s tone held the stubborn self-righteousness of the very drunk and very dumb, and Travis knew he was not stupid.

 

“Have it your way,” he shrugged. “And you called it-- fuck, I mean, you  _ will  _ call it-- The Hunger.”

 

“Mm,” Barry said. “Hey! Are there more noodles?”   
  
Travis looked down his nose at him, eyebrows raised, one of the few glasses-related gestures he still retained despite the years now without them. “Of  _ course _ there are more noodles, Barold, I made enough to last through winter.”

 

“I probably shouldn’t eat them, though,” Barry offered. Travis couldn’t be sure but it sounded like he was trying to infuse some dignity back into his voice, despite being upside down and, also, absolutely wrecked. “I’d probably just chuck ‘em up.”

 

“Probably,” Travis agreed.

 

“So we’ll call it the Hunger,” Barry said. “How come you won’t tell me the names of the other people on the ship? How come you won’t tell me what the ship is called?”

 

“One, because we gave it--  _ fuck!--  _ because  _ you _ will give it a very stupid name. And two, because… because I’m still not super sure how this whole causality thing works and now that we’re in it,  _ really _ in it, I extremely do not want to fuck it up.”

 

“Fair,” Barry said. He burped ominously.

 

“That’s it,” Travis declared, “Time to get up. I’m putting you to bed.”

 

In their two years of comfortable cohabitation, Travis had rarely ventured upstairs. That was Barry’s private space; they had an unspoken but clear sense of each other’s boundaries within the narrow little house. There was something strange about being there now, discovering this new pocket dimension just a few vertical feet from where he himself fell asleep every night and woke up every morning. Strange, he decided, but oddly fitting.

 

Barry, having completed what he insisted was his final trip to the bathroom for the night, had changed into a long flannel nightshirt in a pattern so faded as to be nearly indistinct.

 

“Is that a _floral_ _nightie_?” Travis asked, trying very hard not to crack up at the sight of him.

 

“So what if it is?” Barry asked loftily. He twitched back his coverlet and rolled himself into the bed. “I like a healthy breeze around my--”

 

“Okay!” Travis interrupted. “That’s enough!”

 

He tugged the covers up to Barry’s chin. Barry was already beginning to doze and he sighed contentedly; Travis was abruptly grateful that Barry had remembered to brush his teeth before coming up to bed. He patted Barry’s thatch of curls and gently removed his glasses. 

 

Travis turned to extinguish the lamp on Barry’s nightstand, and then he paused. He looked down at the pair of glasses he had just neatly folded, then at Barry’s peaceful face. He touched the bridge of his nose where his own glasses used to sit.

 

“Barry,” he whispered. No response. He perched gingerly on the edge of the bed.

 

“Barry. How come he didn’t fix your eyes for you?”

 

Barry blinked back awake, finally focusing on Travis. A moment passed. Neither of them spoke. Neither of them had talked about Kravitz, his sudden absence from their lives, since he disappeared.

 

Finally, Barry said, “He wanted to. I didn’t let him.”

 

His voice was soft and more than a little sad. Travis almost regretted asking but thought of all the progress they’d made tonight, the ways he’d finally opened up. No sense in turning back now. Especially since he’d gone to all this trouble to work his own memory-erasing magic on Barry.

 

“Why not? Did you not trust him?”

 

Barry snorted indelicately. “Of course I trusted him. With my life. Literally. But he’s a tailor, not a surgeon.”

 

“A tailor? What do you mean?”

 

Barry had begun to doze again, but Travis waited as he rallied once more. “Tailor. He… You know Paloma?”

 

Travis nodded.

 

“She still speaks the old language, right? She came up with his nickname. It was her way of coming to terms with who he was… who he became. That’s my theory, anyway.”

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“Well, his name’s not just Kravitz, is it?”   


  
“I… I guess not. Isn’t it?”

 

“Huh-uh.” Barry yawned but propped himself up on both elbows, invested now in his story. “Paloma wasn’t happy when he brought her back, you know. He worked so hard to give her a nice little life out there, despite her being dropped in the middle of a forgotten spot in some forgotten plane, but she just didn’t want to accept that her nephew had indebted himself to the Raven Queen. 

 

“I think Istus was the one that brought her around in the end. I’ve kind of pieced it together over time… Istus is budsy with everybody and she started visiting Paloma to keep her company, and they realized they both knit, and got to be pals, and eventually Istus made kind of a metaphor out of the whole knitting thing. The threads of existence, and all that.

 

“So Paloma finally started letting Kravitz visit her again, but she stopped calling him by his real name. I don’t even know what it was.... I’ll be honest with you, Trav, I don’t even know if  _ he _ remembers anymore. But she started calling him Kravitz, kind of scornfully, I guess, ‘cause that’s the word for tailor in their old language. Like if it was you and I started calling you Mr. Snip-Snip-Scissor-Boy or something.”

 

“I don’t know. That’s pretty involved.” Travis said. “Also: pretty cute!”

 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Barry yawned. “You get the picture. She calls him something else now-- Kravchik, or something-- it’s sweet.”

 

“Vitzchke,” Travis said, remembering.

 

Barry nodded sleepily and fell back onto the mattress. “Yeah. Their relationship has improved a lot.”

 

“That’s good,” Travis murmured. 

 

“Mmhmm,” Barry mumbled. “‘S good.”

 

Barry’s eyes were closed but Travis could tell he was more awake than he had been just a few moments before. He let his mind wander, remembering Paloma and her scones and the roses that climbed the ivy along the eaves of her cottage, the mirage-like appearance of her cozy home among the inhospitable mountains surrounding the town.

 

“Do you miss him?” he whispered.

 

Barry was still for a moment, then nodded, never opening his eyes. “Of course I do.”

 

“He really loved you,” Travis said. “He was proud of you.  _ Is  _ proud of you. I’m sure of it.”

 

Barry rolled onto his side, facing the wall. Away from Travis. There was a stretch of silence.

 

“He loved you, too.”

 

The silence stretched longer.

 

“I know,” Travis said at last. “Anyway, make sure you sleep on your side tonight, okay? I don’t need you to John Bonham yourself. We’ve got a lot of work to do. There’s probably loads of better ways to visit Kravitz again.”

 

Barry grumbled a laugh from his nose but dutifully remained on his side.

 

He waited until he heard Barry’s breathing even out and grow deep, and until the lamp burned down to a dim golden halo, and then he spoke very softly into the darkness.

 

“I… I miss him, too.”

 

\--

 

Back downstairs and lying in his bed that night, Travis could not sleep; every time he closed his eyes he was greeted by a barrage of images of little Magnus, of what he imagined the Starblaster could look like, of Kravitz. 

 

He could not shake the sense of having set foot on not just the right path, but his final path.  _ This is it _ , he kept thinking, immediately following it up with  _ I  _ cannot _ fuck this up. _

 

Buttercup whined and shimmied up to him, rolling onto her back, stretching out like a frog in a shameless bid for bellyrubs. He petted her absently and she licked the air in an imperfect attempt to reach his face. She’d been allowed to roam the backyard while he and Barry were drinking and her fur still held the grassy scent of late summer blooms. The smell reminded him of something, some memory, half-sad, and in his drunken insomnia he could not place it.

 

_ One of Teresa’s old perfumes, _ he thought, but that wasn’t right.  _ Maybe one of the bouquets we got when Bebe was born? _

 

Then it hit him. The flowers in their backyard were the same as the ones Kravitz grew in the courtyard behind his quarters in the astral plane. He was not remembering his wife or his daughter, Travis realized, at least not directly; he was remembering a memory of  _ missing  _ them.

 

That afternoon he’d spent weeping in Kravitz’s garden two years ago returned to him vividly, borne aloft on the scent of the flowers. The confusion. The anticipation. The grief, and the diminishing but persistent hope of an imminent return. 

 

Travis inhaled the fading smell of flowers on Buttercup’s fur again and remembered when the wound of missing his family was still so new. He tried to hold on to the memories he’d made  _ with  _ them, not  _ of  _ them, and he realized that time and sorrow had stacked his hand with secondary recollections. Photographs that had grown soft with too much handling.

 

He sighed and rolled over. He wished he could still cry. As aching and empty as his heart felt, he was convinced he’d used up all his tears in the early days.

 

He allowed himself to wonder, as he sometimes did, what Kravitz was doing that was so important he never came back to visit. Much less answer Travis’ calls on the sapphire mirror.

 

Over time, Travis had come up with a few theories, but nothing ever felt true.  _ Maybe he went rogue and quit his job altogether. Maybe he moved in with Paloma and only commutes to the astral plane for work.  _

 

_ Maybe he realized he did reciprocate the Raven Queen’s feelings after all and shacked up with her.  _ (This stirred in him a peculiar jealousy he did not care to interrogate).

 

_ Maybe he drowned out in the waves one day.  _ (Could a deathless demigod drown?).  _ Maybe he’s never been turned down before and got so bitter that he turned mean and is shutting out me and Barry as well as the rest of the world.  _ (Or,  _ worlds _ , he thought).

 

But none of these seemed quite right.

 

Maybe, Travis had decided, he just needed to push away what he loved, so that he could get on with his own life.

 

Maybe he missed Travis and Barry just as much as they missed him.

 

Travis allowed himself to remember the sleepless nights just like this one that had haunted him intermittently during his time on this plane. So many times, he ran macabre and desperate scenarios through his head:  _ If I was run over by a cart in the street, where would I wake up? _

 

_ If orcs raided the city and I couldn’t help fight them off, would I find myself in the astral plane, or back home, or nowhere at all? What if I died in a duel? Would it even matter  _ how _ I died? _

 

_ And if I did… who would remember me? _

 

Through all of these speculations ran a single idea that glimmered out of every dark depth of feeling, an idea almost too bright to be examined at close range. There was, after all, one surefire way he could meet with Kravitz again. One way he could gain his attention.

 

He allowed himself-- no,  _ forced  _ himself-- to remember the nights he had retrieved his little knife from its sheath on his belt and lain with it in his hands or beside him on the worn old quilt. Never using it. Just mulling over what it might be used for.

 

He hoped that those feelings were not somehow imbued in the blade itself now, that he had given it up and passed it to Magnus.

 

But those nights were, by and large, behind him. He forced himself to remember his friends-- those he had left behind on earth, and the new acquaintances he’d made here under this strange violet sky. He forced himself to remember his mom, his enduring painful love for her, the injustice of her truncated time with them. 

 

He held tight to the thought of the people he was bound to in heart and mind. Inevitably, the suns would rise again. Light would creep back in through his window and, slowly, to his heart. He persevered.

 

He knew nights like those-- nights like  _ these _ \-- would continue to visit him sometimes. But now? 

 

Now he had a job to do.

 


	12. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Travis is trying to make a change. Barry does not care to remember. Merle dances onto the scene. Buttercup gets a biscuit, a bone, and briefly forgotten. Alliances are formed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It seems in poor taste to make a joke about not being dead on a story more or less about death, but: I'm not dead! I had shelved the project for a long time but realized I still needed to get to the end. If you're still with me, just know that it means the world. Now, should we check in on these good good boys?
> 
> (I hope you like dwarves) (and also reading about them for like 6,000 words, I'm so sorry) (ok bye I love you)

Travis was disappointed but not surprised to find that life did not suddenly becomes easier once he had assigned a driving purpose to it. Time, likewise, was neither more flexible nor more kind.   
  
He had always hoped that finding his life’s purpose would be like jumping onto a moving train-- the significance of the work would be the engine and the navigator, while all he would have to do would be hold on and feel triumphant and let the wind whip through his hair like some kind of rugged Disney princess. He was a bit miffed to discover that it was, instead, more akin to a painstaking archaeological dig: he had found the vague outline of what he wanted, but to fully unearth it required an eternity of meticulous detail work. 

 

Travis  _ hated  _ detail work.

 

But the idea of having settled on his role in the world had given him a tiny flame in his heart. It grew when he felt he got closer to his goals-- build a ship, unite the crew, save the world. It had nearly overtaken him when he realized he had found Magnus, and it had dwindled pathetically when he first decided to let Magnus go. He could not stand the idea of letting it go out entirely.

 

So following his fairly disastrous meeting with Magnus, Travis forced himself to rally as soon as he woke. No longer would he indulge in his years-deep habit of claiming his first few moments of wakefulness for misery and wallowing, he decided; he would instead spring out of bed, fully upright, and set about his day. He would make breakfast. He would make lists. He would make connections and he would make his dreams a reality.

 

The new routine was terrible. 

 

He’d never been a morning person and frankly he would prefer to still catch naps when he could and daydream about what Teresa and Bebe were doing and whether Justin and Griffin had kept the podcasts up without him. On top of having to get up early every day and actually  _ do  _ things, too, was the fact that being proactive in making history was difficult at times-- and outright terrifying at others.

 

But he persevered. He woke up early, and made breakfast, and crossed items off of his ever-growing list. 

 

Barry was the first to notice. He was, after all, accustomed to making coffee on his own every morning and slipping out the door well before they ever interacted. He was nothing short of shocked the first morning he found Travis cooking eggs in the kitchen before dawn.

 

“Good morning,” Barry had said, obnoxiously chipper even as the two suns struggled to blink themselves over the horizon. He took a seat at the little bistro table and snapped to produce a small floating orb of light over his newspaper as he unrolled it.

 

“Morning,” Travis grunted. “How are you up? It’s not even light yet.”

 

“Of  _ course _ ,” Barry responded, and in the gloaming Travis would have sworn he was wearing a look of something like pity. “You have to be get up with the suns if you’re going to make the most of the day. Which I see you’re doing! Good on you.”

 

Travis knuckled his eye, neglecting to first set down the spatula he held. He shook bits of egg out of his hair.

 

“Yeah, well. Trying to make a change.”

 

Travis squinted against the urge to drowse as he leaned against the stove, watching his humble scramble of eggs and onions slowly solidify into something resembling breakfast. He scraped out a plate for Barry and one for himself. “Go ahead and eat,” he mumbled, setting it down. “I still have to make coffee.”

 

“That you do,” Barry beamed at him before setting into the eggs. “And a cup for me, too, if it ain’t no hair off your back!”

 

Travis’ own breakfast was cold by the time he sat down to it, but the hot coffee more than compensated.  _ I’ll time it better tomorrow, _ he thought, resolute.  _ And even better the day after that _ .

 

And so it went.

 

It was another month at least before his coworkers started to take notice. One Friday morning when he was among the first to arrive on the jobsite, his foreman Herris pulled him aside.

 

“Hey, uh, you doing ok, buddy?” he asked. “Everything alright at home?”

 

Travis laughed. “Yeah, Herris, it’s all good. Just trying to stay on top of stuff, start a new routine. You know.”

 

“Sure, sure,” Herris agreed, his side-eye belying suspicion. Herris was a stout, rugged old dwarf-- a good worker, and a terrible gossip. Travis did not intend to give him any inclination that things were less than rosy. “It’s just, you know, you started showing up all early-- you used to skip out some Fridays, if I remember-- I don’t know, thought maybe you and Barold got into it or something.”

 

Travis flushed at his implication but tamped down a reaction. “No, nothing like that, Herris. Though it’s very sweet of you to ask!” Herris humphed. ‘Sweet’ was clearly not a descriptor he strove for.  “But… while it’s just us here,” Travis went on, thinking on his feet, “I do have some, um, ideas that I’ve been working on. Listen… You used to work in the Astronomy department, right?”

 

Herris nodded. “Great!” Travis said. “Do you happen to know the Astronomy Dean?”

 

Herris’ craggy face creased into a grin. “In fact, I do!” he rumbled. “My cousin. I can introduce you, if you like!”

 

“Yeah! I mean, yes, please, that would actually be really great! You don’t mind?”

 

“Not at all!” Herris was fairly bouncing. “What’s the occasion? You’re not looking to move to a new department, are ya? We’re only a few months from done on this bad boy.”

 

“No, nothing like that,” Travis assured him. “Just… I had an idea I wanted to run past him.” 

 

“Her,” Herris corrected.

 

“Right, her,” Travis amended quickly. “Sorry. Do you think we could all three get together sometime soon, maybe break bread? Something like that?”   
  
“I’ll do you one better! We’ve got a-- well, a bit of a  _ thing _ coming up tomorrow, was planning to meet up with ol’ Sabik and head into town together. Meet us at the Stone’s Throw tavern tomorrow for an early drink before she and I have to take off, say three hours past sunup?”

 

“Sure!” Travis said. “It’s not like a-- like a family thing, is it? I won’t be imposing?”   
  
Herris tossed his grizzled head back and barked a laugh. “ _ Lord _ , no. It’s a family thing only as much as all dwarf functions are. You know how it goes.”

 

“Cousins on cousins,” Travis offered. 

 

“Makes datin’ a pain.”

 

“I can imagine! So, three past at the Stone’s Throw tomorrow?”   
  
“Yessirree, that’ll do ‘er. Now if you’ll excuse me, boss, I gotta go yell at those masons before they get any bright ideas about how that corbelling on the back side of the entry arch ought to placed.”

 

“Sure, sure,” Travis said idly, raising his hand in a wave. He watched Herris go and scratched the back of his neck. Asking about the Astronomy dean had been impulsive, but he’d been thinking of asking Herris about it for awhile; he’d heard rumors that the dean wanted to use the Academy’s new building--Travis’ own project-- to expand into a xenology department incorporating the work of the more advanced cosmology professors. He’d figured Herris and his gossip might have more insight but a personal connection to the dean herself was just as good-- no,  _ better _ .

 

He worked the rest of the day in something of a fog, thinking of what to say to the dean the following morning, and closed up the site and walked home without hardly even registering the trip. 

 

Barry shouted down a greeting to him from his study when Travis arrived home. He appeared a moment later at the top of the stairs, hair mussed, a pencil tucked behind one ear and another protruding from the pocket of his jeans. “Hey,” he said. “Want to cook?”

 

“Huh? Oh-- sure. But you’re not allowed to help, okay?”

 

Barry grinned down at him. “No problem. Let me grab my jacket and let’s pick some stuff up from the market quick.”

 

“Sure,” Travis said. He set down his work satchel, fishing out his coin purse and transferring it to his pocket. Finding Buttercup curled up in his room, he grabbed a sweater and hustled her outside for a pee break, rewarding her with a homemade biscuit when she trotted right back inside without needing to be called. She munched it in gleeful abandon, broadcasting her crumbs in all directions as she followed him to the living room to wait for Barry with her tail swinging lazily in her wake. 

 

“Okay!” Barry said, tromping down the stairs. “Hello again! I was thinking stew. Does that sound ok? Is Buttercup going to come with?”

 

The Buttercup in question made a show of curling immediately into a cozy donut and raising her eyebrows at Barry.

 

“She’s way too lazy,” Travis said. “Come on, she can guard the house.”

 

They stepped out into the brisk air, the breeze off the river rapidly growing chill. Barry shivered and stuffed his hands in his pockets, jerking the sides of his jacket together. Travis burrowed his chin into his sweater, crossing his arms, tucking his hands under his arms to keep them warm.

 

“Maybe we should pick up some mittens when we get to the square,” he said. Barry chuckled. “Yeah, could do. Or something like that anyway. You’ve got a good sweater there, though. I always meant to ask-- is it a Paloma original?”

 

“Oh! It is!”

 

Barry nodded. “Yeah, looks like her work. I had a couple too but I, uh, outgrew ‘em.”

 

“Well, that makes sense,” Travis said, trying to sound sensible and not at all amused. He knew Barry was sensitive about the spare tire he’d been slowly cultivating. He thought it was adorable. “I mean, you were probably so much younger the last time you saw her.”

 

“Yeah!” Barry agreed, latching on. “Yeah, exactly, much younger. Anyway, it’s a good look. I like the purple color. What is that, like, a-- merlot? A plum?”

 

“Something like that!” Travis said. “And thanks! It used to match my hair, but obviously that’s grown out. If I’m being honest it was definitely more flattering on Kravitz.”

 

Barry almost stumbled, but recovered. He shot Travis a sidelong glance. “How come Kravitz was wearing your sweater?”

 

“Oh, not mine. He had a matching one. From Paloma, I mean. Or, well, I guess it was  _ actually  _ Istus. She moves in mysterious ways.”

 

“You can say that again,” Barry mumbled. They walked a few strides further. Travis knew bringing up Kravitz was risky-- hell, maybe even cruel-- but  _ he _ missed him, and honestly, who else could he talk to about it?

 

“Maybe he’s wearing his right now, too,” Travis said lightly. 

 

Barry grunted a half-laugh. “Don’t go getting all sentimental on me, McElroy. I think of the dude like my dad, I don’t wanna have to imagine the two of you like wearing matching outfits and holding hands or whatever.”

 

“Don’t be a bigot!” Travis chided gently. Barry held up his hands, still in the pockets of his jacket. “Hey, whoa, I’m not being serious. I don’t mean you shouldn’t hold hands with anybody, or, like, guys shouldn’t hold hands or some crap. It’s just-- you know.”

 

“No, I know,” Travis said. He bumped Barry’s shoulder lightly with his own. “I know you’re cool. It was never like that, though. I have a wife at home. Or, I had-- well.”

 

“Yeah,” Barry said. “I know, I got your drift. I can’t imagine.”

 

“It gets a little easier all the time,” Travis said, but the cracks in his lie where evident even to him. He paused and added, more honestly, “It was worth it to know her. To be with her.”   
  
“Sounds like a pretty nice deal. Having somebody like that,” Barry said, and even his awkwardness could not hide the sincerity in his words. Travis looked at him, studying his profile.

 

“You’re not a bad looking dude, Barry. You’re smart, you’re a good guy. A terrible cook, but I mean, you could always go out to eat.”

 

“Uh, Trav, what exactly are you trying to say to me right now?”

 

“You should date more!”

 

“Oh. Heh,” Barry said, pronouncing the sound of laughter without committing to the act itself. His mouth twisted into the barest hint of a grin. “I don’t need to date. I got a job.”

 

“ _ Well _ , hold on,” Travis said. “That does not even remotely fulfill the same-- the same-- like, the same space of personhood. You can definitely have both!”

 

Barry shrugged. “Job keeps me busy. Makes me happy. I wouldn’t want to sacrifice any of my work to spend more time trying out relationships which, you know,  _ statistically  _ are not going to last.”

 

“Statistics are not sexy, Barold.”

 

“Eh, so sue me. I’m really just holding out for some kind of cutie pie coming to work in my department, you know what I mean? Then I don’t have to take time off work to hang around with ‘em.”

 

Travis laughed. He couldn’t help but think of Lup. He thought, for the millionth time, how excited he was to meet the twins when the time finally came. He shook his head, trying to clear it of his awkward omniscience in this particular regard. 

 

“Fair enough,” Travis said. It was so hard to hold his tongue at moments like this. “Speaking of work, though, you know Herris?”

 

“Your dwarf guy? Sure.”

 

“Well, he’s not  _ my  _ dwarf guy, but yeah! You know he used to work in the Astronomy department?”

 

“No kidding? I thought he was kind of a lump.”

 

“Nah, he’s alright, just a chatterbox. Anyway, I asked if he could introduce me to the dean sometime, and guess what!”

 

“He said yes?”

 

“He said yes! We’re all meeting up tomorrow morning!”

 

“Well, alright, that’s great, Trav,  but what-- what do you need to know the dean for?”

 

“Oh, have I not told you my plan?”

 

“Your… plan?”

 

“Yeah! To try and get the Academy to expand into practical expeditions.”   
  
“That’s bold,” Barry said. He sounded impressed. “But practical expeditions to where? Other planes?”

 

“Of course,” Travis said. He paused. “You remember me telling you about all this, right? About the Institute of Planar Research and Exploration?”

 

Barry rubbed his eyes with one hand, shading them against the dusky light from the one remaining sun in the sky. “Honestly, Trav, I remember that you told me a bunch of stuff a few weeks back, but I was so blasted. I barely remember what we talked about. I know there some real heavy stuff and at some point you were, like, drawing something out for me? Or something? But I can’t even find the card where you wrote it out, or the pictures, or whatever.”

 

A cool stone seemed to have settled in the depths of Travis’ stomach. He felt suddenly alone again, alone in the burden of his knowledge of what was to come, alone in his mission to make it a reality. 

 

And then, a glimmer of relief: at least Barry wouldn’t have to walk around with the weight of knowing when and how the world would end. 

 

At least one of them would be able to have a halfway normal life.

 

“It’s no big deal,” Travis said at last. “Just… Earth stuff. Boring.”

 

“If you say so.”

 

“Anyway, I was-- well, I was thinking, maybe the Academy should break with tradition a little bit and try expanding into actual manned-- uh, I mean, not  _ manned _ but, like, piloted?-- piloted expeditions. Maybe we could help bring them into the future, you know?”

 

Barry slowed his pace. “Why?”

 

“Well, because there’s--”

 

“Listen, Travis, the Academy has been around for centuries, ok? We do important work there. Just as is. You’ve been here, what, two years and change? And you want to come in and tell ‘em how they ought to be running things?”

 

“No! No, it’s not like that at all--”

 

“Listen, if this is some kind of long con to try and get to Kravitz, it’s not worth it, ok?”

 

“It’s not that,” Travis tried to say, but Barry spoke right over him. “He abandoned us here. It’s not worth making the effort.” 

 

Barry’s eyes glinted and he drew his sleeve across his face quickly, angrily. Travis reached to touch his shoulder. Barry shrugged him off. “He doesn’t give a shit, ok? He’s made that perfectly clear.”

 

“Barry--”

 

“Let’s just get some fuckin’ food,” Barry huffed, and stalked away. Travis hadn’t even realized they’d reached the edge of the market and as he raised his head he was embarrassed to see they’d had a small audience. A half dozen assorted folks quickly averted their gazes as he looked up, suddenly enthralled in the price of potatoes or counting out coin; only one, a young woman at a scribing booth, held his gaze as their eyes met. A moment passed, and he inclined his head to her, and when she nodded back he hurried after Barry.

 

\--

 

Keeping with his new commitment to the early-rising lifestyle, Travis was up at first light and eager to pass the few short hours he had before meeting with Herris and his cousin.

 

He made breakfast and coffee and afterwards washed his face carefully, taking extra time to braid back his hair. He wished, not for the first time, that this world had clippers; now that his hair was grown out past his shoulders he kept thinking how cool it would look with shaved sides. He perused his limited closet until he came up with an outfit which, he felt, rode the fine line between “impressively suave” and “embarrassingly eager,” then laughed at himself for his concern--  _ it’s not like I’m going on a date with the dwarves _ , he reminded himself,  _ I’m only asking them to invest in an off-worlder’s crazy vision of the future. No big! _

 

In the end, he chose a clean pair of soft leather leggings dyed a charcoal grey and a woven tunic worked in greens and secured with a diagonal line of quartz buttons; the ensemble, he felt, complemented his natural coloring quite nicely. He laced his heavy work boots, donned a long boiled-wool jacket he’d purchased the previous winter, and wound a scarf around his neck before checking the mirror.  _ Feeling cute!  _ he thought out of habit. Really, though, he was pleased with his reflection. He definitely looked competent, if not downright reputable--  _ someone to be taken seriously _ , he thought, and felt proud. He hoped it worked.

 

Loading up his coin purse and keys, he peeked out his bedroom window at the backyard sundial. Surely it was almost time to go?

 

The dial showed one hour past sunup. 

 

Travis cursed and sat down on the edge of the bed. With two hours to kill, he could-- what? Read a book? The fiction he’d found in this world was thrilling, sure, but tended to be built on a system of history and values that he had little experience with. He could maybe bake something, or leave some bread dough to proof, but he was feeling a little jaded after Barry’s outburst yesterday and as a result did not feel motivated to contribute to household snacks.

 

Almost as if summoned by Travis’ sullen musings, Barry’s footsteps sounded across the creaking wooden floors above him. _Aw shit,_ Travis thought. He wasn’t quite ready to rehash yesterday’s tiff in the market, nor was he interested in tolerating Barry’s chilly silence over breakfast. _With two hours, I could_ _probably afford to take Buttercup for a nice long walk_ , Travis thought, _she sure deserves it after having to wait inside for me to come home from work all week long._

 

So he whistled low and caught Buttercup by the collar as she galloped in, hooking up her leash and harness. They slipped out the back door as Barry descended the stairs at the front of the house, and wound their way around the yard and out into the street.

 

As he walked, he thought about what he wanted to say to the Astronomy dean. How many ways were there to go about the idea?  _ This is a real nice Academy you got here, but what if you did it, like, totally differently?  _ Travis toyed idly with his coat buttons as he watched Buttercup sniff out a pee spot on the side of the road. Maybe Barry was right-- maybe he was being arrogant.

 

He rolled his shoulders and straightened up.  _ So what if it’s arrogant!  _ He thought.  _ What do I have to lose? As far as I know, this is  _ literally  _ my purpose on this earth, and how often does a person get that kind of certainty? _

 

But life, as he knew, did not get easier once imbued with purpose. He still felt unsettled and unsure.

 

Buttercup, at least, had a simpler direction, and one she was happy to pursue-- having marked her territory, she tugged the leash taut as she continued her way down the street. Travis had been letting her lead, and they were most of the way to the market by now.

 

He tried to imagine things from her point of view. At least when he’d found himself bereft of life-- or at least, his former life-- he got to badger Kravitz about it, ask questions, make a case for himself. At least he had found a purpose for these last few years. Buttercup was dead too-- at least as much as he was-- but what did she get for it? 

 

She slowed her walk now and trotted halfway back to him, tail waving tentatively side to side. She could always tell when he was feeling morose. Was  _ that  _ all she was here for? To be by his side? A wave of guilt washed over Travis and his heart bobbed low in its wake.  _ What has this looked like for her?  _ He wondered.  _ What kind of story has she had to watch unfold in stops and starts? What’s she thinking? _

 

He watched her, misty-eyed, as she discovered a beetle in the dirt and nosed down to trace it; noticing her attention, it took flight, and she followed it as far as her limited height would allow before giving up and deciding to instead settle in for a thorough cleaning of her rear end.

 

_ Dogs,  _ Travis thought, fighting tears.  _ Too pure. _

 

\--

 

Travis managed to distract himself all morning, lost in a mission to give Buttercup a good day. After an hour and a half of racing, chasing, fetch, and frequent stops to gnaw an itch on her paws or track down her own tail, they were each feeling winded and chipper. 

 

They stopped at a soup vendor’s stall where Travis wheedled a harried young halfling into handing over an oxtail bone from their massive broth pot, which he immediately passed on to an ebullient Buttercup. A few dumplings for his own breakfast, an extra copper to the cook, and another twenty strides brought them to the Stone’s Throw Tavern.

 

“You stay here, Bubba, okay?” Travis tied her leash to the railing outside the Tavern’s narrow, warped windows. He  _ might  _ be able to keep an eye on her from the bar if he got a good table. “I won’t be gone too long, I don’t think.” A prickle of anxiety lit his nerves. He tugged his tunic down, straightened his sweeping coat, smoothed his hair. Buttercup munched her bone in bliss and did not acknowledge him.

 

“Okay!” he breathed, and stood. He pushed the tavern door open wide.

 

As dramatic entrances go, it wasn’t. He stood silhouetted in the doorway, morning light behind him, wintery chill and the sharp bite of fate rushing in around him, and the toothless old barkeep barely looked up. He wasn’t even the first one in-- a hulking ogre woman and a red-haired human in a long leather jacket were finishing their breakfasts next to the measly fire, and a dwarf at the counter appeared to be still sleeping off the merriment of the night before.

 

Travis paused, and squinted out of habit to be sure-- no, the dwarf was not Herris. Feeling a bit sheepish, Travis pushed a coin to the barkeep for a flagon of weak stout and after a moment’s hesitation added another two coins for a plate of toast and sausages.

 

_ Why am I building this up so much?  _ He chided himself, setting down his second breakfast and arranging his jacket over the back of the chair.  _ It’s not like they’re thinking of this as some world-ending thing. It’s just breakfast in a pub. It’s not even their main event today.  _

 

He sighed, and rolled his shoulders, and waited.

 

\--

 

If his preparations for the morning had been anticlimactic, the conversation around the Academy’s future was even less so. Herris bustled in with the Astronomy dean shortly after Travis had sat down and introduced the handsome dwarf woman as his cousin Sabik.

 

Herris shot straight for the bar as Sabik settled herself across from Travis. She surveyed his face as if trying to read his intentions before he even opened his mouth, her eyes an incisive shade of indigo beneath eyebrows as thick and glossy as black beetles.

 

“Herris says you want to talk about my department,” she said. Her words seemed to stream only from one side of her hard mouth, barely stirring the long wisps of her mustache. “What about, exactly?”

 

“Yes,” Travis said, trying to smooth the fluster from his tone, “That’s right. Also, hi. Hello. I’m Travis!”

 

“I know,” Sabik said. “What about my department?”   
  
Travis shot a quick glance to Herris, still leaning on the bar and squinting at the short scroll which held the draught beer descriptions. He blew out a little breath and tried to even out his brain. “About, well… Well, I’m curious what work is being done around-- around, I guess, further explorations. Outreach, in a way.”

 

“Exploration is a funny word,” Sabik said. She turned slightly in her chair, pointing her nose away from the rest of the room and training a sideways gaze on Travis. “Tell me what you mean by that,”

 

Had Travis thought to be diplomatic in this moment, he would have dismissed it as useless; for better or worse, he was too excited at the nearness of his vision to mince words.

 

“I want to talk about off-world expeditions,” he said, “other planets. Other planes.”

 

“That’s crazy.” Sabik said. She didn’t shift her gaze.

 

“I know,” Travis said. He wasn’t sure if he should be discouraged by her words, or bolstered by the fact that she was still focused intently on him. “But I think we can do it. I have an idea for a ship--”

 

“Got you a lager, Sabik, hope that’s a’right!” Herris thundered as he crashed a flagon onto the table. “Whoops, sorry ‘bout your toast, there, Boss.” He fished a filthy handkerchief from his pocket and flung it toward Travis, who mopped gingerly at the spilled beer. “‘Ow’s it goin’ over here?”

 

“Fine, Herris, thank you,” Sabik said primly. She tucked her tightly braided beard into the scarf she wore around her throat and took a delicate sip. Her eyes never left Travis’ face. He was beginning to wonder if she had blinked at all since sitting down.

 

“Biki, you won’t believe it, guess who I found at the bar?”

 

Finally Sabik pulled her eyes away from Travis and followed Herris’ pointing forefinger to the bar, where a woozy-looking middle-aged dwarf waved feebly at them, unkempt strawberry blonde hair escaping from a sloppy topknot to form a voluminous tuft over his forehead.

 

“ _ Merle! _ ” Sabik sighed, loud enough for the other dwarf to hear. His face fell, waving hand following suit soon after.

 

“ _ Merle?!”  _ Travis all but shouted.

 

“Merle,” Herris confirmed jubilantly. He shot a delayed wave back to the bar-dwarf.

 

“Isn’t he performing in--” Sabik squinted at the sunlight through their window. “--an hour?”

 

“Near about,” a new voice said. Merle was sliding unsteadily from his stool and, after balancing a moment as he reacquainted his feet with the floor, headed toward them. Sabik scooted her chair aside neatly to make room for him.

 

“Hiya,” Merle said to Travis as he sat down. “I see you know my cousins, but I’m afraid you don’t know me. Merle Highchurch.” He extended a broad hand. Travis, speechless, reached across the table in slow motion to shake it.

 

Up close, Merle’s eyes were bloodshot, but his smile was wide and genuine. He emanated a reek of sour ale as well as the pleasantly earthy smell of plants gone just slightly to rot; traces of greenery in his hair seemed to suggest he had either braided flowers into it some days prior or possibly just barrel-rolled through a garden on his way to the bar.

 

“Travis,” Travis said weekly, “Travis McElroy. It’s an hon-- a pleasu-- it’s, uh, it’s good to meet you, Merle.”

 

“Whatcha talkin’ about?” Merle asked blithely, seemingly unfazed by Travis’ stammering. He sipped from Sabik’s flagon.

 

“School,” Sabik said curtly before Herris could intervene. She turned her intense gaze once more to Travis. “We’ll pick up the conversation later. I know how  _ you _ feel about the Academy, Merle.”

 

“That’s right!” Merle sighed, “School! Who needs it.” He turned to Travis: “My cousins here were always the brains of the family. Packed up and left the commune to get book-learnt while the rest of us roamed wild and free beneath the open sky. No better teacher than Mother Nature, you know.” He winked lasciviously. “She excels in a  _ variety  _ of lessons.”

 

“Ew,” Travis said, just as Sabik said, “Yes, and much good it’s done you.” There was a new edge of ice in her voice.

 

“Are you excited for the performance?” Herris asked Merle.

 

“Oh, yes, can’t wait!” Merle beamed, only the mildest of tremors in his voice.

 

“Performance?” Travis asked. He was having trouble keeping up-- rather, he was having trouble thinking about anything besides the actual flesh-and-blood Merle Highchurch sitting so near him.

 

“Merle’s an artist!” Herris cut in, a ghost of boasting in his voice. Clearly he held more fondness for Merle than Sabik did. 

 

“And a holy man,” Merle admonished him, the boast roaring in his tone, completely at odds with the sentiment.

 

“That’s right,” Herris nodded, “A holy artist. He’s got a new showcase coming up today. That’s where Biki and I are headed.”

 

“Sabik,” Sabik corrected him, but it fell on deaf ears.

 

“A showcase! Wow.” Travis said. He was struggling to sound normal-- but then, what  _ was  _ normal? And why on earth would it matter? “Do you have anything you need to prepare? Like, um… a costume? Or something?”

 

“Oh no! It’s highly conceptual, you see. I’ve been  _ living  _ it these last few days.” Merle gestured at the wilted leaves that dotted his unkempt hair. His tone turned pitying. “It’s not really for everyone. I’m not really sure a random Joe off the street would really  _ understand _ .”

 

“I’m sure Travis is more than capable of comprehending your improv routine,” Sabik said flatly.

 

“It’s not improv!” Merle sputtered. “It’s a transcendent interdisciplinary exploration of how Pan has blessed the material plane with wonders great and small.  _ Especially  _ small. Specifically dwarf-sized,” he added with another wink.

 

“It’s an unpracticed dance routine, plus talking,” Sabik informed Travis directly.

 

“Oh,” he replied. He was at a loss for anything more than that. It was all too fascinating. And strange.

 

\--

 

It was not difficult for Travis to finagle an invitation to Merle’s performance, and the four of them set out together toward a clearing where, apparently, Merle’s showcase was to take place. After the first twenty minutes or so, he had to train himself not to look to Sabik or Herris to confirm the outright lewdness of Merle’s various twirls, kicks, attempted backsprings, or unsettling hand gestures. Not wanting to seem impolite and turn away entirely, he settled into an uncomfortable reverie by focusing at a point just beyond the clearing Merle had co-opted for use as a stage and trying to let his eyes go unfocused, rendering the dancing dwarf a swirl of indistinct pinkish hair and floral fabric (which, to Travis’ relief, stayed on Merle’s body for nearly the whole performance).

 

“ _ Well _ ,” Sabik said as the performance ended. It did not sound as if she was going to elaborate from there.

 

“Uh… yeah,” Travis agreed, rubbing the back of his neck.

 

“That was  _ great! _ ” Herris crowed. “Amazing! Ol’ Merle always blows me away.” He nudged Travis’ ribs. “Pretty incredible, huh? You looked transfixed! Exactly how I felt when I first saw him perform!”

 

“Oh, yeah,” Travis said absently. It was abruptly clear to him that he was either going to have to offer his congratulations to Merle or find an exit. Quickly.

 

“Merle!” Herris called from beside him. “Over here!” Sabik exhaled heavily through her nose and Travis wondered if she was also considering a rapid egress. Herris beamed as Merle waddled toward him through a scant crowd of well-wishers and, improbably, fans. 

 

“I’m so glad you came out,” Herris said to Travis. “We should hang out outside of work more often!”

 

“Yeah, totally,” Travis’ mouth said. His brain was reconciling itself to the fact that there was no escape to be made.

 

“Well, howdy, folks!” Merle boomed as he approached. His blustery charisma seemed only to have intensified following his routine, though his topknot looked even worse for wear and the flowers in his beard were bruised and smelling potent. Herris embraced him fondly and a tear twinkled in the foreman’s beady black eye.

 

“Biki, what did you think? How about you, Trent?”

 

“It’s Sabik,” Sabik said, as Travis said “Actually, my name is Travis,” but both were drowned out by Herris. “Ah, Merlie, you were a force of nature! A thing to behold! Travis couldn’t take his eyes of you!”

 

“Now hold on--” Travis started.

 

“You’re too kind, you’re too kind!” Merle’s false modesty was cloying. Sabik actually sneezed. “I’m so glad you were able to get  _ something  _ out of it, Travis, even though I’m sure your human mind can only wonder in awe at the depth-- the passion!-- of dwarvenkind.”

 

“Uh huuuuh,” Travis agreed, drawing out the word. Sabik sneezed again, the tiniest vestige of a laugh buried beneath the sound. “How long have you been, uh, doing this?”

 

“Oh, years now,” Merle breezed.

 

“No kidding,” Travis deadpanned. “Say, you know, it was really good to meet you, Merle, but I just remembered I have to, um, I have…”

 

“A dog,” Sabik cut in abruptly. “He left his dog at the Stone’s Throw.”

 

“Holy shit!” Travis cried. “I  _ did! _ ”

 

“Ah, a lover of animals,” Merle said. His gaze was spanning over the now-dispersing crowd as he said it but Travis did not pause to question what he might have been looking for. “I’m more of a bear.”   
  
“A bear… guy? Like you want a pet bear?” Travis asked, pausing in his Buttercup-centered panic to try and make sense of Merle’s words.

 

“Nope,” Merle said, and made for a clot of well-wishers who had been trying to catch his eye.

 

“Okay, well, this was…  _ so  _ fun, um, thank you for inviting me, it’s been lovely to meet you,” Travis rushed, “but I’m really sorry, I’ve got to run!”

 

“I’ll escort you,” Sabik interjected. “Herris, tell Merle I said-- tell him-- ah, he knows. Anyway. It’s always good to get the family together. I’ll see you for dinner this week.”

 

“Bye, Biki,” Herris called as Sabik spun Travis back down the path out of the meadow and toward the city. “ _ Sabik, _ ” she hissed beneath her breath. Travis patted her shoulder.

 

“Thanks for reminding me about Buttercup.”

 

She shrugged. “I figured you were distracted. I don’t blame you, after… that.”

 

“It was, uh, quite a thing to behold, wasn’t it?”   
  
Sabik sighed deeply. “It only gets worse with every iteration. I wish he would get a real job and leave the dancing to someone else. Anyway, the best part of the performance is when I finally get to leave, so it’s good to have an excuse.”

 

“What did you say?”

 

“I-- oh! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply your dog was just an excuse. I’m sure you want to get back to her anyway.”

 

“No, not that,” Travis said, “the other part. About Merle getting a job?”

 

Sabik eyed him sideways again. “I said Merle should get a real job.”

 

“Yeah,” Travis said thoughtfully. “Yeah, that was it.” Somehow, his spat with Barry yesterday and the shock of seeing Merle in person had shaken his focus on kicking off the expedition, finding a way to form the IPRE. He slowed to a stop, stepping off of the main path and gesturing for her to follow; she considered him with her flashing blue eyes and, after a moment, complied.

 

“Sabik,” Travis started, earnestly, “I know I came at you out of nowhere talking about practical expeditions. I recognize how generous it was of you to give your time to meet with me today, and especially for you and Herris-- and Merle-- to bring me with you to this-- this, uh-- well, to this. And, at risk of sounding like a crazy person, I do feel like things happen for a reason, and today--”

 

“I am disinterested in romance,” Sabik interjected. “With you or anyone else.” She paused. “Sorry.”

 

“No, no, not that,” Travis said impatiently, holding up both hands. “I mean, totally cool for you, live your truth, that’s great, also I have a wife, but that is not where I’m going with this!” She nodded for him to continue.

 

“So, I mean-- I appreciate your time, and that you listened to me this morning, and I  _ know  _ it’s a crazy dream, but, Sabik, what if… what if this is where it starts? With your help and guidance, and I can help any way I can, and maybe somebody like Merle to--” (he swallowed, hard, trying to stop himself from saying too much) “--to study plants or life forms or medicines, send back the research. People to make this crazy dream happen… could we do it, do you think?”

 

Sabik held him in her gaze for a long, silent moment, considering. “It’s  _ not _ crazy.” she said at last. 

 

“It’s no secret around the Academy that I am interested in xenology and especially planar research. Planar… exploration.” She exhaled through her nose and Travis had the sudden sense that these interests had not been met with compassion or grace throughout her career. 

 

“I’m brilliant, Travis. I know how that sounds, but it’s true. I have read every treatise ever published on the astronomy of our world, all the way down to ancient runes that had never been deciphered before. I mean, I dug those runic carvings out of the earth myself. I have contributed several tomes of my own findings. I’ve added exponentially to my field, and in so doing, I have reached the logical limits of feasibility and interest in continuing the same work.

 

“Listen. I… I was told for so long that dwarves should stay underground. Even our extended family, with its admittedly odd ties to natural magics, stayed close to the earth, where our forebears built and maintained their subterranean civilizations for generations. But no matter how much they told me I was crazy, I just wanted to see the stars. And now… now I  _ know _ the stars, and I want to see more, and every time I am told I should know my place and stay in my own field of research, it just sounds like the same scared resistance. From my family, from my colleagues. My friends.

 

“I feel it too strongly for it to be wrong. I have to conclude that anyone who is more interested in propriety than discovery cannot be on the right side of history. It’s not only the bias. It is a lack of imagination. A lack of courage, a lack of heart.”

 

“ _ Yes, _ ” Travis whispered softly. 

 

“I lied to you before,” Sabik informed him. “By omission. I pretended to not know about you.”

 

“But you…  _ do  _ know about me? Or?”

 

“I do,” she continued. “My colleagues talk about you sometimes.”

 

“Good things, I hope!” Travis interjected nervously.

 

“No,” Sabik said, her voice flat. “You first came to my attention when I overheard a group of cosmology professors joking about the idiot asking about extraplanar research missions.”

 

“ _ Ouch, _ Sabik!” Travis had known he’d come on a little strong at first trying to find traction for laying the framework of the IPRE. But  _ damn _ .

 

“I did not join in,” she said, apparently intending to reassure him. “I will be honest: I was secretly grateful. Grateful that I was no longer alone in the idea, no longer alone in being the target for their jokes. I kept my ears open, and I heard more stories, and I grew curious. I… I may have pulled a few strings to get Herris assigned to your project.”

 

“Okay,” Travis said. “Okay, I see. But is this the part where you reveal you’re actually, like, some big-time sorcerer or something? Making magic happen from behind the scenes?”   
  
Sabik grinned broadly at him then, and he realized it was the first time he had seen her smile.

 

“I’m not,” Sabik said. “I’m just a regular person. Like you. And you were right, Travis. This is where it starts.” She reached out and squeezed his arm, a surprisingly warm gesture. 

 

“Now come on, let’s go get your dog. And while we’re walking… tell me about this ship you want to build.”


End file.
